she is very different, isn't she?"

"Well, but so am I," said Karen, "and they talked to me. I don't mean to
complain of your friends; that would be very rude when they were so nice
and kind; and, besides, are your friends. But people's thoughtlessness
displeases me, not that I am not often very thoughtless myself."

Gregory was anxious to exonerate himself. "I hope she didn't feel left
out;" he said. "I did notice that she wasn't talking. I found her in the
garden, alone--she seemed to be enjoying that, too--and she and I went
about for quite a long time together."

"I know you did," said Karen. "You are not thoughtless. As for her, one
never knows what she feels. I don't think that she does feel things of
that sort at all; she has been used to it all her life, one may say; but
there's very little she doesn't notice and understand. She
understands--oh, perfectly well--that she is a queer old piece of
furniture standing in the background, and one has to remember not to
treat her like a piece of furniture. It's a part of grace and tact,
isn't it, not to take such obvious things for granted. You didn't take
them for granted with her, or with me," said Karen, smiling her
recognition at him. "For, of course, to most people I am furniture, too;
and if Tante is about, there is, of course, nothing to blame in that;
everybody becomes furniture when Tante is there."

"Oh no; I can't agree to that," said Gregory. "Not everybody."

"You know what I mean," Karen rejoined. "If you will not agree to it for
me, it is because from the first you felt me to be your friend; that is
different." They were walking in the flagged garden where the blue
campanulas were now safely established in their places and the low
afternoon sun slanted in among the trees. Karen still wore her hat and
motoring veil and the smoky grey substance flowed softly back about her
shoulders. Her face seemed to emerge from a cloud. It had always to
Gregory's eyes the air of steadfast advance; the way in which her hair
swept back and up from her brows gave it a wind-blown, lifted look. He
glanced at her now from time to time, while, in a meditative and
communicative mood, she continued to share her reflections with him.
Gregory was very happy.

"Even Tante doesn't always remember enough about Mrs. Talcott," she went
on. "That is of course because Mrs. Talcott is so much a part of her
life that she sometimes hardly sees her. She _is_, for her, the dear old
restfu