In a rush of broken sentences with long pauses between which somehow told
almost as much as words, Belle recalled some of the scenes of that
summer, and Georgina, who up to this night had only glimpsed the dim
outlines of romance, as a child of ten would glimpse them through old
books, suddenly saw it face to face, and thereafter found it something to
wonder about and dream sweet, vague dreams over.

Suddenly Belle stood up with a complete change of manner.

"My! it must be getting late," she said briskly. "Aunt Maria will scold
if I keep you out any longer."

Going home, she was like the Belle whom Georgina had always known--so
different from the one lifting the veil of memories for the little while
they sat in the pavilion.

Georgina had thought that with no Barby to "button her eyes shut with a
kiss" at the end of her birthday, the going-to-sleep time would be sad.
But she was so busy recalling the events of the day that she never
thought of the omitted ceremony. For a long time she lay awake, imagining
all sorts of beautiful scenes in which she was the heroine.

First, she went back to what Uncle Darcy had told her, and imagined
herself as rescuing an only child who was drowning. The whole town stood
by and cheered when she came up with it, dripping, and the mother took
her in her arms and said, _"You_ are our prism, Georgina Huntingdon!
But for your noble act our lives would be, indeed, desolate. It is you
who have filled them with rainbows."

Then she was in a ship crossing the ocean, and a poor sailor hearing her