CHAPTER XIII

"A continual dripping in a very rainy day
and a contentious woman are alike."--_The Bible_.


In the late spring Leonie stood at a cottage window watching the rush
of the incoming water as she listened to her aunt's ceaseless lament,
idly wondering if both would reach high tide together, and if there
would be any chance of slipping out for a swim before bedtime.

She loved her aunt with the protective love of the very strong for the
very weak, and smilingly found excuses for the daily tirade against
fate, or ill-luck, or whatever it is weak people blame for the hopeless
knots they tie in their own particular bit of string by their haphazard
bursts of energy, or apathetic resignation to every little
stumbling-block they find in their path.

Daily, almost hourly, through the splendid North Devon winter the aunt
had wailed, and bemoaned, and fretted, driving the girl out on the
tramp for hours in the wind, and the wet, and the sun, only to return
hurriedly at the thought of the weak, hapless, helpless woman in the
cottage at Lee.

Susan Hetth complained about everything, from the lack of society to
the smallness of her income, plus a few scathing comments upon her
niece's weather-browned face and the hopeless outlook for her
matrimonial future.

Her own bid in the matrimonial market _en secondes noces_ had failed,