She was supremely Anglo-Saxon; fresh, fervid and buoyant with
an actual buoyancy of the early spring. She had tact and ability,
otherwise she could never have preserved peace between the contending
factions, Belloc and Fabian, old John Grier, the mother and Carnac. She
was as though she sought for nothing, wished nothing but the life in
which she lived. Yet her wonderful pliability, her joyful boyishness, had
behind all a delicate anxiety which only showed in flashes now and then,
fully understood by no one except Carnac's mother and old Denzil. These
two having suffered strangely in life had realized that the girl was
always waiting for a curtain to rise which did not rise, for a voice to
speak which gave no sound.
Yet since Carnac's coming back there had appeared a slight change in her,
a bountiful, eager alertness, a sense of wonder and experiment, adding
new interest to her personality. Carnac was conscious of this increased
vitality, was impressed and even provoked by it. Somehow he felt--for he
had the telepathic mind--that the girl admired and liked Tarboe. He did
not stop to question how or why she should like two people so different
as Tarboe and himself.
The faint colour of the crimsoning maples was now in her cheek; the light
of the autumn evening was in her eyes; the soft vitality of September was
in her motions.
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