rk.

"_Poor dear_! I know you are feeling desolate. It's so hard for you,
isn't it, dear, having no other brother or sister? Makes it all the
harder, doesn't it, dear! And Kathie _leant_ on you so! You must feel
that your work is gone. Stranded! That's the feeling, isn't it? I
_do_ understand. But"--(sudden change to major key)--"_she_ is happy!
You must forget yourself in her joy!"

I said, "Oh! yes," and removed my hand under pretence of feeling for a
handkerchief. Her face lengthened again, and she drew a deep sigh.

(Minor.) "I always feel it is the last straw for a woman when she has to
give up her home in a time of trouble. A home is a refuge, and you have
made The Clough so charming. It will be a wrench to move all the dear
old furniture, and to leave the garden where you and Kathie were so
happy together. Wherever you look, poor dear, you must feel a fresh
stab. Associations!--so precious, aren't they, to a woman's heart?
(Major.) But material things are of _small_ value, after all, dear. We
learn that as we grow _old_! A true woman can make a home wherever she
goes--"

"I--I suppose she can."

(Minor.) "But of course the loneliness _is_ a handicap. Having no one
who needs you, no one to welcome you home. So sad! Especially in the
evenings! Solitary people are apt to grow morose. You will miss
Kathie's bright happy ways. (Quick change!) Well! Well! No one
_need_ be lonely in this world. There are thousands of suffering souls
fainting by the wayside for lack of the very help which it is in your
power to give. If I could just tell you of some cases I know!"

I pricked up my ears.

"I wish you would. I like to hear about other people's troubles!"

"My dear! Such a startling way of putting things! You don't mean it.
I know your tender heart! Of course the worst cases are in the big
cities. London, now! Every time I go to London, and travel as one is
obliged to do from one end of the city to the other, I look out upon
those endless rows and rows of streets of small houses, and at the great
towering blocks of flats at every turn, and feel _appalled_ at the
thought of the misery that goes on inside!"

"And the joy!"

"My dear, what kind of joy _can_ there be in such places?"

"Not your kind perhaps, nor mine, but real enough all the same. People
love one another, and have their own pleasures and interests. Little
clerks come home to little wives and tell of little succes