Stephen was very happy. He wrote to Eunice,--he had been engaged to her since the end of his second year at the Law School,--'Washington Square is rather terrifying from the outside, but once inside you feel beautifully at home. I think it's the perfect breeding you find there. I've met women more intellectual, greater perhaps, than Professor Lansing's sister, but never one who gives such an impression of completion. There are no loose ends. You will like her, Eunice.' In another letter he said, 'We won't have much money to start with, of course, but if we put a little dignity into our kitchenette apartment, it will be a home that people will love to come to. It's partly the dignity of their living that makes these Washington Square people so worth while to be with.' And last week he had written, 'You won't find New York lonely. They will love you, dear. You belong. You have not only charm but the dignity that belongs. I wonder if I'm foolish to care so much for that word dignity. Perhaps it's because I associate it with you, or perhaps--I love you because you have it.' And Eunice too was happy and proud: happy that Stephen was coming into his own, and proud that he should think her equal to the occasion. It would not be an easy task, being equal to Stephen. Stephen was a great man, or would be a great man. She knew it and Stephen knew it. 'We are going to be great, you and I,' he had said more than once. And yet one day when she had answered, 'You and I, Stephen?' his eyes, which had been alight with the glorious vision of the future, softened, and he had come and knelt beside her and had laid his head down. 'Oh, Eunice,' he had whispered, 'I've got brains; I'm pretty sure to be successful; but if I'm worth while, it will be because of you. You are a great woman, dear.' And Eunice had mothered him and had hoped--so fervently that the hope was a prayer--that she would really be great enough to meet his needs. Sometimes she doubted. She had dignity; Stephen had said so; but inside she was deprecating and shy. People like Mabel Ashley made her shy, and most of the people she knew were like Mabel. They thought Stephen's way of saying and thinking things 'funny.' There was only one woman whom she could talk with, a High-School teacher who had come to board next door. She and the High-School teacher took long walks together. The High-School teacher had been to Europe twice. She knew how people lived outside of this little Ohio town--outside of the United States even. She was full of shrewd comment. Eunice talked to her about the books that she and Stephen were reading, and sometimes about Stephen himself. Several times the High-School teacher had said, 'He is splendid, Eunice.'