Peter did not answer; and after a moment she went quietly and quickly from the room, with the new air of quiet responsibility that she had worn ever since the accident.

CHAPTER XXIV

Peter saw, with a sort of stupefaction, that life was satisfying her now as life had never satisfied restless, exacting little Cherry before.  Not that she knew it; she was absolutely unconscious of the truth, and he realized that she would have been genuinely shocked by it.  But there was a busy energy about her now, an absorbed and contented concentration upon the duties of the day, a cheerfulness, a philosophy, that were new.

There had been touched by all this terrible time unexpected deeps of maternal tenderness in childish little Cherry; there had been unsuspected qualities of domesticity and sacrifice.  A new Cherry had been born, a Cherry always beautiful, always resourceful, always admired.  Busy with Martin’s trays, out in the garden searching for shy violets, conferring with the Chinese boy, pouring tea for afternoon callers, Cherry was newly adequate and newly happy.

She spent much of her free time by her husband’s side, amusing him as skillfully as a mother.  What was she doing?  Why, she was simply basting fresh cuffs into her afternoon gown.  He was getting so popular that she had to be ready for callers every day.  Would he like her to keep George Sewall for dinner, then they could play dominoes again?  Would he like the table with the picture puzzle?  He would like just to talk?  Very well; they would talk.

Martin’s day was so filled and divided with small pleasures that it was apt to amaze him by passing too quickly.  He had special breakfasts, he had his paper, his hair was brushed and his bed remade a dozen times a day.  Cherry shared her mail, which was always heavy now, with him; she flitted into the sick-room every few minutes with small messages or gifts.  With her bare, bright head, her busy white hands, her voice all motherly amusement and sympathy and sweetness, she had never seemed so much a wife.  She had the pleasantest laugh in the world, and she often laughed.  The sick-room was kept with exquisite simplicity, with such freshness, bareness, and order as made it a place of delight.  One day Cherry brought home a great Vikory bowl of silvery glass, and a dozen drifting goldfish, and Martin never tired of watching them idly while he listened to her reading.

“Cherry,” Peter said, on a wet January day, when he came upon her in the dining room, contentedly arranging a fragrant mass of wet violets, “I think Martin’s out of the woods now.  I believe I’ll be moving along!”

“Oh, but we want you always, Peter!” she said, innocently regretful.

The ghost of a pained smile flitted across his face.

“Thank you,” he said, gently.  “But I think I will go,” he added, mildly.  She made no further protest.