s than a month, she
had found a helpmate, one who showed her sympathy and consideration.

The cocoa was hot and foamy and delicious. They drank it sitting each at
an end of the table with its white cloth that stood between the two
windows.

"You're a smart young lady," Kathleen announced. "Who taught you to cook
so well?"

"Oh, I just picked it up."

That was all the answer. Kathleen had already noticed that she received
short replies when she questioned Hertha about her past.

"I can't keep that poor woman out of my head," Kathleen went on after a
pause. "Here am I supping this elegant drink, and she without a crumb in
the house."

"What woman?" Hertha asked. "Oh, yes, I know," guiltily. "You mean the
woman the man told us about? But you don't know what may have happened.
Perhaps she has all she wants now."

"Perhaps she has, in heaven."

"Oh, you can't tell. Lucky things happen sometimes."

"Do they? I've mostly seen unlucky ones. But luck is a poor thing for
any of us to be counting on."

"I don't know, I've been lucky, very lucky."

"Have you? When?"

"Well, once, down South, not so long ago. And I was lucky when I met
you."

"Indeed it was I had the luck then."

"Indeed, I had. If you could have seen the awful room, Kathleen, that
Miss Jones sent me to look at! In a cheap boarding house, and with a
landlady who looked as though she would cheat you half the time and
scold you the other half."

"That would have been a happy home to return to when you'd been out at
night to see two lovers parted only to meet again! Now, sit where you
are. The cook doesn't wash the dishes."

"No, but she dries them," Hertha said decisively; and together they
cleared away the things.

"I'd give a penny to know your thoughts," Kathleen remarked as she wrung
out the dishcloth and hung it up to dry.

Hertha did not answer. She was pulling a leaf from the geraniums,
crushing it in her fingers. She had left the lovers of the play and was
back in an orange grove, her own lover close to her side. "You are
Snowdrop of the fairy tale," he was saying. It had come true, she was
Snowdrop, and yet of her own will she had destroyed the fairy tale. Whom
might he not be making love to now? All at once she felt homesick and
very tired.

Perhaps Kathleen a little guessed her thoughts. "It must be slow enough
for you here with nobody but an old maid around like me. I wish I knew a
fine young fellow to ask to dinner on Sunday."