lities of comfort.

"I heard that on the train," I said then awkwardly,--and I was the more
awkward that I was not persuaded of any reason in my words,--"that about
'the shadow of good things to come.' Maybe it meant something."

Delia More's thin, high-pitched voice came back to me, expressing all my
unvoiced doubt.

"Tisn't like," she said. "I never take any stock."

Then I looked at my dark house in a kind of consternation lest it had
heard me trying to give comfort, for within those walls I had sometimes
spoken almost as this woman spoke. But it occurred to me that even the
drowned should throw immaterial ropes to any who struggle in dark
waters.

It will not be necessary, I hope, to say that I followed Delia More that
night from no faintest wish to know what might happen to her. For I have
a weak desire for peace of mind, and I would rather have forgotten her
story. I followed because the quiet highroad was so profoundly lonely,
and the country silence is ambiguous, and I cannot bear to think of a
woman abroad alone in the dark. I cannot bear to think of myself abroad
alone in the dark, though I go quite without fear; but certain other
women have fear, and this one was crying. I kept well behind her, and as
soon as she reached the village, I meant to lose sight of her and
return, for a village is guardian enough. But when we had passed the
bleak meadow of the slaughter-house and the wide, wet-smelling wood yard
and had reached the first cottage on Daphne Street, I was startled to
see her unlatch that cottage gate and enter the yard. And I was suddenly
sadly apprehensive, for the cottage was the home of Calliope, who that
morning had left the village and had asked me to say nothing about it.
What if this poor creature had fled to Calliope for sanctuary, only to
find locked doors? So I waited in the shadow of a warehouse like a
bandit; and I raged at the thought of having possibly to harbour this
stranger among the books of my quiet home.

Then suddenly I saw a light shining brightly in Calliope Marsh's
cottage, and some one wearing a hat came swiftly and drew down a shade.
On the instant the matter was clear to me, who have a genius for certain
ways of a busybody. Calliope must have known that this poor girl was
coming; Calliope's warning to me to keep silence must have been a way of
protection to her. And here to Calliope's cottage Delia More had come
creeping, whom all Friendship would hold in righteous dist