The woman smiled bitterly, tranquilly, while her glance roamed over the
familiar landscape.

"Yet it is better than the rest, back there," she protested, in a low
voice. "At least, there is something open, and a little green in spring,
and the nights are calm. It seems the least little bit like what it used to
be in Wisconsin on the lake. But there we had such lovely woodsy hills, and
great meadows, and fields with cattle, and God's real peace, not this
vacuum." Her voice grew faint.

"You liked it there?" the doctor asked musingly.

"It's all that I have ever known that was--as it should be. My father had a
farm," she explained more easily, "and until he died and I was sent to
Rockminster College to school, my life was there, by the lake, on the farm,
at the seminary on the hill, where my brother was studying--"

The visions of the past developed with endless clews, which she could not
follow aloud. After waiting for her to resume, Sommers asked tentatively:

"Why don't you go back, then?"

She flashed a rapid, indignant glance at him.

"Now! Go back to what?--With _him_!"

Her lips set tight. He had been stupid, had hit at random.

"No, no," she continued, answering her own heart; "they would never