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t week there was borne in upon her a realisation of the loneliness of the great city which was never obliterated. A girl like herself, coming to London without introductions, might lead this desert life, not for a week alone, but for _years_! Her youth might fade, might pass away, she might grow middle-aged and old, and still pass to and fro through crowded street, unnoted, uncared for, unknown beyond the boundaries of the schoolroom or the office walls. A working-woman was as a rule too tired and too poor to join societies, or take part in social work which would lead to the making of friends; she was dependent on the thoughtfulness of her leisured sisters, and the leisured sisters were too apt to forget. They invited their own well-off friends, exhausted themselves in organising entertainments which were often regarded as bores pure and simple, and cast no thought to the lonely women sitting night after night in lodging-house parlours. "If I am ever rich--if I ever have a home, I'll remember!" Claire vowed to herself. "I'll take a little trouble, and _find out_! I couldn't do a hundredth or a thousandth part of what ought to be done, but I'd do my share!" Cecil announced her return for the evening of January 2nd, and remindful of the depressing influence of her own arrival, Claire exerted herself to make the room look as homelike as possible, and arranged a dainty little meal on a table spread with a clean cloth and decorated with a bowl of holly and Christmas roses. At the first sound of Cecil's voice she ran out into the hall, hugged her warmly, and relieved her of a bundle of packages of all sorts and sizes. "You look a real Mother Christmas hidden behind parcels. What are they all? Trophies? You _have_ come off well! It is lovely to see you back. If you'd stayed away the whole time I think I should have grown dumb. My tongue would have withered from sheer lack of use. I never realised before how much I love to talk. I do hope you feel sociable. I want to talk and talk for hours at a time, and to hear _you_ talk, too." "Even to grumble?" Claire grinned eloquently. "Oh, well--if you _must_, but it would be rather mean, wouldn't it, after a holiday, and when I've got everything so nice? I am driven to praise myself, because _you_ take no notice." "You have given me no time. You chatter so that no one else can get in a word." Cecil took off hat and gloves, and threw them down on the so
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