Joan slept heavily, dreamlessly, and awoke to—­more bacon and eggs with hot rolls and coffee added.

“I’m going to float about a bit to-day,” she said, and her feet were fairly dancing.  “I’ve only known New York before holding to Aunt Dorrie’s hand or my nurse’s.  Today I’m going to go back alone and then—­catch up with myself.”

Suddenly she began to sing her old graduation song: 

    “I’ll sail upon the Dog-star
      I’ll sail upon the Dog-star;
    I’ll chase the moon, till it be noon,
      But I’ll make her leave her horning.

    “I’ll climb the frosty mountain
      And there I’ll coin the weather. 
    I’ll tear the rainbow from the sky
      And tie both ends together.”

Sylvia leaned back, clapping and laughing.  This was as it should be.  Fun, youth, gaiety.  She went to her easel in the north room, humming Joan’s old ballad, and never did better work in her life than she did that day.

Joan sallied forth equally happy and her past, thank heaven, had been brief enough and rosy enough to make the tying of the ends nothing but a joyous task.  She rode downtown on top of a bus.  The crisp air stung and rallied her.  She longed to sing from the swaying vehicle—­she felt as if she were on top of the world and that it was keeping time to the tune she wanted to sing.  She looked so lovely that the conductor grinned delightedly as he remarked: 

“Snappy weather, miss!” and Joan nodded in friendly fashion and agreed.  She walked to the old home, standing with drawn blinds by the little, close-locked park.  It looked stately and reserved as one of the family might have done.  It smilingly held its tongue.

“I’d like to see the sunken room and the fountain,” Joan thought.  “I cannot imagine it with the fountain and the birds still.  They will never be still for me!”

She was a bit surprised to feel how far she had travelled from the Joan who was part of Nancy and the sunken room.  It was quite shocking to find that she was not missing Nancy.  She wondered if she were heartless and selfish?  But after all, how could one be missed from a life in which she had never, could never, have part?  And full well Joan realized that in this big venture of hers the old, except as a stepping-stone, was separated forever.

“If I become famous”—­and Joan, tripping along, felt as if fame were as possible for her as the luncheon she was now feeling the need of—­“if I become famous then they will understand, but even then my life and theirs will be different.”

This point of view made Joan feel important, tragic, but desolate.

“I’m hungry,” she thought, seriously, and made her way to a restaurant, where once she had gone with Doris while on a wonderful shopping expedition.  The place was little changed; it had passed into other hands, but the menu proudly proclaimed the same enticing dishes.

Joan ordered what once had seemed the food of the gods, but to her now it was as chaff.