That evening at supper-time, Missy noticed that mother walked down the block to meet father, and seemed to be talking earnestly with him on their way toward the house. Missy hadn't much dreaded father's opposition. He was an enormous, silent man and the young people stood in a certain awe of him, but Missy, somehow, felt closer to him than to most old people. When he came up the steps to the porch where she waited, blushing and palpitant but withal feeling a sense of importance, he greeted her jovially. “Well, I hear we've got a full-fledged writer in our midst!” Missy's blush deepened. “What _I_ want to know,” father continued, “is who's going to darn my socks? I'm afraid socks go to the dickens when genius flies in at the window.” As Missy smiled back at him she resolved, despite everything, to keep father's socks in better order than ever before. During supper the talk kept coming back to the theme of her Work, but in a friendly, unscoffing way so that Missy knew her parents were really pleased. Mother mentioned Mrs. Brooks's “bridge” Thursday afternoon--that might make a good write-up. And father said he'd get her a leather-bound notebook next day. And when, after supper, instead of joining them on the porch, she brought tablet and pencil and a pile of books and placed them on the dining-table, there were no embarrassing comments, and she was left alone with her thrills and puzzlements. Among the books were Stevenson's “Some Technical Considerations of Style,” George Eliot's “Romola” and Carlyle's “Sartor Resartus”; the latter two being of the kind that especially lifted you to a mood of aching to express things beautifully. Missy liked books that lifted you up. She loved the long-drawn introspections of George Eliot and Augusta J. Evans; the tender whimsy of Barrie as she'd met him through “Margaret Ogilvie” and “Sentimental Tommy”; the fascinating mysteries of Marie Corelli; the colourful appeal of “To Have and To Hold” and the other “historical romances” which were having a vogue in that era; and Kipling's India!--that was almost best of all. She had outgrown most of her earlier loves--Miss Alcott whom she'd once known intimately, and “Little Lord Fauntleroy” and “The Birds' Christmas Carol” had survived, too, her brief illicit passion for the exotic product of “The Duchess.” And she didn't respond keenly to many of the “best sellers” which were then in their spectacular, flamboyantly advertised heyday; somehow they failed to stimulate the mind, stir the imagination, excite the emotions--didn't lift you up. Yet she could find plenty of books in the Library which satisfied. Now she sat, reading the introspections of “Romola” till she felt her own soul stretching out--up and beyond the gas table-lamp glowing there in such lovely serenity through its gold-glass shade; felt it aching to express something, she knew not what.