But was rubbing really better than rusting, if it were but a voluntary and needless friction? Lucy realised now that the deeper agonies and anxieties and the more strenuous efforts of the past few months had given her new standpoints, and had separated her from much which she would once have tolerated without question. She remembered having read the utterance of a certain writer, somewhat to this effect—“I have been through the furnace, and I have passed out too scorched to mingle freely with those who are not even singed.” Lucy could not quite see the matter in that aspect. Rather she would have expressed herself—“I have been out on God’s wolds, under His open sky with its storms and its starlight, and I cannot again relish close, artificially-lit rooms, sickly with manufactured perfumes.” Oh, when once Charlie was at home again, how much they would have to be thankful for, in their life grown at once wider and deeper! What a new meaning was given to the old words, “The Lord drew me out of many waters.... He brought me forth also into a large place.” So Lucy’s long holiday from her classes at the Institute proved both restful and delightful. Nor were they barren of practical results. She found many picturesque “bits” to sketch near London. Work of this kind was such pure joy to Lucy that she was apt to forget that nevertheless it remained a strain upon the nerves. She might have been wiser, ay, and thriftier too, had she indulged herself in a little sheer idleness, in lying among the clover making daisy chains or cowslip balls for Hugh. As it was, when he grew tired of playing alone, he would nestle down beside mamma, watching her busy fingers and begging for “a story,” for which he never begged in vain. Oh, those were happy days, peaceful in their present calm, radiant with big hopes dawning! Then the evening coming-home was always cheery, with Miss Latimer hovering over the teacups, Tom’s merry welcome, and the sighing Clementina’s conscientious preparations for their creature-comforts. If Lucy’s ceaseless industry did not permit her to gather up all the physical benefit she might have got, at least her nightly rest grew sweet and calm, and the troubled haunting visions vanished. She herself found much satisfaction in regaining her healthy moral poise. It did not fret her now when Jane Smith openly gibed at her in the street. It did not worry her when Jessie Morison’s mysterious female ally was seen passing the house, and lingering in front of the gate, as if half inclined to call. Nay, she bore herself with courage and resolution when the policeman rang the bell in the middle of the night, and roused all the household to hear that a man was lying in the area, having evidently climbed over the locked gate and descended the stairs.