It was terrible to see Hannah, with that look on her face, going about her tasks automatically.  And Edward, too, seemed suddenly to have become aged and broken; his trust in the world, so amazingly preserved through many vicissitudes, shattered at last.  He spilled his coffee when he tried to drink, and presently he got up and wandered about the room, searching for his overcoat.  It was Janet who found it and helped him on with it.  He tried to say something, but failing, departed heavily for the mill.  Janet began to remove the dishes from the table.

“You’ve got to eat something, too, before you go to work,” said Hannah.

“I’ve had all I want,” Janet replied.

Hannah followed her into the kitchen.  The scarcely touched food was laid aside, the coffee-pot emptied, Hannah put the cups in the basin in the sink and let the water run.  She turned to Janet and seized her hands convulsively.

“Let me do this, mother,” said Janet.  She knew her mother was thinking of the newly-found joy that Lise’s disgrace had marred, but she released her hands, gently, and took the mop from the nail on which it hung.

“You sit down, mother,” she said.

Hannah would not.  They finished the dishes together in silence while the light of the new day stole in through the windows.  Janet went into her room, set it in order, made up the bed, put on her coat and hat and rubbers.  Then she returned to Hannah, who seized her.

“It ain’t going to spoil your happiness?”

But Janet could not answer.  She kissed her mother, and went out, down the stairs into the street.  The day was sharp and cold and bracing, and out of an azure sky the sun shone with dazzling brightness on the snow, which the west wind was whirling into little eddies of white smoke, leaving on the drifts delicate scalloped designs like those printed by waves on the sands of the sea.  They seemed to Janet that morning hatefully beautiful.  In front of his tin shop, whistling cheerfully and labouring energetically with a shovel to clean his sidewalk, was Johnny Tiernan, the tip of his pointed nose made very red by the wind.

“Good morning, Miss Bumpus,” he said.  “Now, if you’d only waited awhile, I’d have had it as clean as a parlour.  It’s fine weather for coal bills.”

She halted.

“Can I see you a moment, Mr. Tiernan?”

Johnny looked at her.

“Why sure,” he said.  Leaning his shovel against the wall, he gallantly opened the door that she might pass in before him and then led the way to the back of the shop where the stove was glowing hospitably.  He placed a chair for her.  “Now what can I be doing to serve you?” he asked.

“It’s about my sister,” said Janet.

“Miss Lise?”

“I thought you might know what man she’s been going with lately,” said Janet.

Mr. Tiernan had often wondered how much Janet knew about her sister.  In spite of a momentary embarrassment most unusual in him, the courage of her question made a strong appeal, and his quick sympathies suspected the tragedy behind her apparent calmness.  He met her magnificently.