'
We left the classroom quietly, conscious that we had been brushed by the
wing of a great feeling, though perhaps I alone knew Cleric intimately
enough to guess what that feeling was. In the evening, as I sat staring at
my book, the fervour of his voice stirred through the quantities on the
page before me. I was wondering whether that particular rocky strip of New
England coast about which he had so often told me was Cleric's patria.
Before I had got far with my reading, I was disturbed by a knock. I
hurried to the door and when I opened it saw a woman standing in the dark
hall.
`I expect you hardly know me, Jim.'
The voice seemed familiar, but I did not recognize her until she stepped
into the light of my doorway and I beheld--Lena Lingard! She was so
quietly conventionalized by city clothes that I might have passed her on
the street without seeing her. Her black suit fitted her figure smoothly,
and a black lace hat, with pale-blue forget-me-nots, sat demurely on her
yellow hair.
I led her toward Cleric's chair, the only comfortable one I had,
questioning her confusedly.
She was not disconcerted by my embarrassment. She looked about her with
the naive curiosity I remembered so well. `You are quite comfortable here,
aren't you? I live in Lincoln now, too, Jim.
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