Her existence at Conjuror's House was perhaps a little complex, but it
was familiar. She knew the people, and she took a daily and unwearying
delight in the kindness and simplicity of their bearing toward
herself. Each detail of life came to her in the round of habit,
wearing the garment of accustomed use. But of the world she knew
nothing except what she had been able to body forth from her reading,
and that had merely given her imagination something tangible with
which to feed her self-distrust.

"Must I decide at once?" she asked.

"If you go this year, it must be with the Abítibi _brigade_. You have
until then."

"Thank you, father," said the girl, sweetly.

The shadows stole their surroundings one by one, until only the bright
silver of the tea-service, and the glitter of polished wood, and the
square of the open door remained. Galen Albret became an inert dark
mass. Virginia's gray was lost in that of the twilight.

Time passed. The clock ticked on. Faintly sounds penetrated from the
kitchen, and still more faintly from out of doors. Then the rectangle
of the doorway was darkened by a man peering uncertainly. The man wore
his hat, from which slanted a slender heron's plume; his shoulders
were square; his thighs slim and graceful. Against the light, one
caught the outline of the sash's tassel and the fringe of his
leggings.