She never told Howard about it.  He had his own difficulties with his father, and she would not add to them.  She managed the house, checked over the bills and sent them to the office, put up a cheerful and courageous front, and after a time sheathed herself in an armor of smiling indifference.  But she thanked heaven when the time came to send Lily away to school.  The effort of concealing the armed neutrality between Anthony and herself was growing more wearing.  The girl was observant.  And Anthony had been right, she was a Cardew.  She would have fought her grandfather out on it, defied him, accused him, hated him.  And Grace wanted peace.

Once again as she followed Lily and Mademoiselle up the stairs she felt the barrier of language, and back of it the Cardew pride and traditions that somehow cut her off.

But in Lily’s rooms she was her sane and cheerful self again.  Inside the doorway the girl was standing, her eyes traveling over her little domain ecstatically.

“How lovely of you not to change a thing, mother!” she said.  “I was so afraid—­I know how you hate my stuff.  But I might have known you wouldn’t.  All the time I’ve been away, sleeping in a dormitory, and taking turns at the bath, I have thought of my own little place.”  She wandered around, touching her familiar possessions with caressing hands.  “I’ve a good notion,” she declared, “to go to bed immediately, just for the pleasure of lying in linen sheets again.”  Suddenly she turned to her mother.  “I’m afraid you’ll find I’ve made some queer friends, mother.”

“What do you mean by ’queer’?”

“People no proper Cardew would care to know.”  She smiled.  “Where’s Ellen?  I want to tell her I met somebody she knows out there, the nicest sort of a boy.”  She went to the doorway and called lustily:  “Ellen!  Ellen!” The rustling of starched skirts answered her from down the corridor.

“I wish you wouldn’t call, dear.”  Grace looked anxious.  “You know how your grandfather—­there’s a bell for Ellen.”

“What we need around here,” said Lily, cheerfully, “is a little more calling.  And if grandfather thinks it is unbefitting the family dignity he can put cotton in his ears.  Come in, Ellen.  Ellen, do you know that I met Willy Cameron in the camp?”

“Willy!” squealed Ellen.  “You met Willy?  Isn’t he a fine boy, Miss Lily?”

“He’s wonderful,” said Lily.  “I went to the movies with him every Friday night.”  She turned to her mother.  “You would like him, mother.  He couldn’t get into the army.  He is a little bit lame.  And—­” she surveyed Grace with amused eyes, “you needn’t think what you are thinking.  He is tall and thin and not at all good-looking.  Is he, Ellen?”

“He is a very fine young man,” Ellen said rather stiffly.  “He’s very highly thought of in the town I come from.  His father was a doctor, and his buggy used to go around day, and night.  When he found they wouldn’t take him as a soldier he was like to break his heart.”