had carried such a heart of passionate hopes and fears up this
mossed path between these peaceful flower-beds.

This appearance of the place began to bring before Flora the full
enormity and impertinence of her errand, but though her heart beat on
her side as loud as the brass knocker upon the door, she had no mind for
turning back.

A high, cool, darkly gleaming interior, mellow with that precious tint
of time which her own house so lacked, received her. And here, as well
as out of doors, all the while she sat waiting she felt that protected
peace was still the deity of the place. To Flora's eager heart time was
streaming by, but the tall clock facing her measured it out slowly. Its
longest golden finger had pointed out five minutes before the sweeping
of a skirt coming down the hall brought her to her feet.

Mrs. Herrick came in hatless, a honeysuckle leaf caught in her gray
crown of hair, geraniums in her hand. Flora had never seen her so
informal and so gay.

"I would have asked you to come out into the garden, except that it's so
wet, and there's no place to sit," she said.

Flora apologized. "I knew if I came at this hour I should interrupt you,
but really there was no help for it." She glanced down at her satchel.
"I had to go this morning, and before I went I had to see you about the
house. I'm going down to look at it and--and to stop a while."

Mrs. Herrick hesitated, deprecated. "But you know Mrs. Britton wasn't
satisfied with the price I asked."

"Oh," said Flora promptly, "but I shall be perfectly satisfied with it,
and I want to take possession at once."

The positive manner in which she waved Clara out of her way brought up
in Mrs. Herrick's face a faint flash of surprise; but it was gone in an
instant, supplanted by her questioning puzzled consideration of the
main proposition.

"Oh, I hope you haven't come to tell me you want it changed," she
protested. "You know it's quite absurd in places--quite terrible indeed.
It's 1870 straight through, and French at that; but even such whims
acquire a dignity if they've been long cherished. You couldn't put in or
take out one thing without spoiling the whole character."

"But I don't want to change it, I want it just as it is," Flora
explained. "It isn't about the house itself I've come, it's about going
down there. You see there are--some people, some friends of mine. I
haven't promised them to show the house, but I have quite promised
myself to show