"I'll make a Novena for you," said the nun, hopelessly. She said it in the same way as she would have offered to knit a woolen vest. "To-day is the Assumption." It was as if she justified the woolen vest by a change in the weather. Sylvia thanked her for the Novena just as she would have thanked her for the woolen vest. "Or perhaps you'd like a priest?" the nun suggested. Sylvia shook her head. "I don't feel I require professional treatment yet," she said. "Don't look so sad, little Sister. I expect your Novena will help me to what I'm trying to find--if I'm trying to find anything," she added, pensively. "I think really I'm waiting to be found." The nun retired disconsolate; the next day Sylvia's spiritual problems vanished before the problem of getting up for the first time, of wavering across the ward and collapsing into a wicker chair among three other convalescent patients who were talking and sewing in the sunlight. The uniformity of their gray shawls and gray dressing-gowns made Sylvia pay more attention to the faces of her fellow-sufferers than she might otherwise have done; she sat in silence for a while, exhausted by her progress across the ward, and listened to their conversation, which was carried on in French, though as far as she could make out none of them was of French nationality. Presently a young woman with a complexion like a slightly shriveled apple turned to Sylvia and asked in her own language if she were not English. Sylvia nodded. "I'm English, too. It's pleasant to meet a fellow-countrywoman here. What are you going to do about the war?" "I don't suppose much action on my part will make any difference," said Sylvia, with a laugh. "I don't suppose I could stop it, however hard I tried." The Englishwoman laughed because she evidently wanted to be polite; but it was mirthless laughter, like an actor's at rehearsal, a mere sound that was required to fill in a gap in the dialogue. "Of course not," she agreed. "I was wondering if you would go back to England as soon as you got out of hospital." "I shall if I can rake together the money for my fare," Sylvia said. "Oh, won't your family pay your fare back? Didn't you get that in the agreement?" "I don't possess a family," Sylvia said. "Oh, aren't you a governess? How funny!" "It would be very much funnier if I was," said Sylvia. "My name is Eva Savage. What's yours?" Sylvia hesitated a moment and then plunged. "Sylvia Snow." Immediately afterward, with an access of timidity, she supplemented this by explaining that on the stage she called herself Sylvia Scarlett. "On the stage," repeated the little governess. "Are you on the stage? You are lucky." Sylvia looked at her in surprise, and realized how much younger she was than a first glance at her led one to suppose. "I came out to Russia when I was nineteen," Miss Savage went on. "And of course that's better than staying in England to teach, though I hate teaching."