Breakfast seems to be, in common experience, the most difficult meal of the day, and yet that hour hangs in memory still as one of the brightest I ever spent. The table was set on the terrace, and its white napery, the best Glenarm silver and crystal, and a bowl of red roses still dewy from the night, all blended coolly with the morning. As the strawberries were passed I felt that the little table had brought us together in a new intimacy. It was delightful to sit face to face with Miss Pat, and not less agreeable to have at my right hand this bewildering girl, whose eyes laughed at me when I sought shame in their depths. Miss Pat poured the coffee, and when I took my cup I felt that it carried benediction with it. I was glad to see her so at peace with the world, and her heart was not older, I could have sworn, than the roses before her. "I shall refuse to leave when my time is up!" she declared. "Do you think you could spend a winter here, Helen?" "I should love it!" the girl replied. "It would be perfectly splendid to watch the seasons march across the lake. We can both enroll ourselves at St. Agatha's as post-graduate students, and take a special course in weather here." "If I didn't sometimes hear trains passing Annandale in the night, I should forget that there's a great busy world off there somewhere," said Miss Pat. "I am ashamed of myself for having been so long discovering this spot. Except one journey to California, I was never west of Philadelphia until I came here." The world was satisfactory as it stood; and I was aware of no reason why it should move on. The chime of the chapel tower drifted to us drowsily, as though anxious to accommodate itself to the mood of a day that began business by shattering the hour-glass. The mist that hung over the water rose lazily, and disclosed the lake agleam in the full sunlight. Though Miss Pat was content to linger, Helen, I thought, appeared restless; she rose and walked to the edge of the terrace, the better to scan the lake, while Miss Pat and I talked on. Miss Pat's gift of detachment was remarkable; if we had been looking down from a balcony upon the Grand Canal, or breakfasting in an Italian garden, she could not have been more at ease; nor did she refer even remotely to the odd business that had brought her to the lake. She was, to be explicit, describing in her delightful low voice, and in sentences vivid with spirit and color, a visit she had once paid to a noble Italian family at their country seat. As Helen wandered out of hearing I thought Miss Pat would surely seize the opportunity to speak of the girl's father, at least to ask whether I had heard of him further; but she avoided all mention of her troubles. Helen stood by the line of scarlet geraniums that marked the balustrade, at a point whence the best view of the lake was obtainable--her hands clasped behind her, her head turned slightly. "There is no one quite like her!" exclaimed Miss Pat.