Penelope smiled. 'No, but it is a very fair imitation of one. This is the Melancthon Settlement. Perhaps you have heard of it? No? Ah, well, this place was built by my husband.' Penelope's voice became graver in quality. She added, after a short pause: 'I lived here during the whole of my married life, and of course I still come whenever I'm in town and can find time to do so.' Something in the girl's face made her add hastily: 'Not as often as I ought to do.' But to her young companion this added word was but a further sign of the humility, the thinking ill of self, which she had always been taught is one of the clearest marks of sanctity. Cecily's mind was filled with empty niches, waiting to be filled with those heroes and saints with whom she might have the good fortune to meet in her pilgrimage through life. Straightway, to-day, one of these niches was filled by Penelope Robinson, and though the radiant figure sometimes tottered--indeed once or twice nearly fell off its pedestal altogether--Cecily's belief in her certainly helped the poor latter-day saint, after her first and worst fit of tottering was over, to live up to the reputation which had come to her unsought. III The large panelled hall sitting-room to which the outside doors of the Settlement gave almost direct access, and of which the sole ornament, if such it could be called, consisted of a fine half-length portrait of a young man whose auburn hair and pale, luminous eyes were those of the typical enthusiast and dreamer, was soon filled with an eager little crowd of men and women, who, as if drawn by a magic wand, hastened from every part of the large building to welcome Mrs. Robinson. One slight and very pretty girl, whose short curly hair made her look somewhat like a charming boy, struck Cecily as very oddly dressed, for she wore a long straight, snuff-coloured gown, and a string of yellow beads in guise of sash. Cecily much preferred the look of an older and quieter-mannered woman, who, after having shaken hands with Mrs. Robinson, disappeared for some moments, coming back ladened with a large tea-tray. 'You see,' said the girl in the snuff-coloured gown--'you see, we wait on ourselves.' 'Then there are no servants here?' Cecily spoke rather shyly. She thought the Settlement quite strangely like a convent. 'Of yes, of course there are; but tea is such an easy meal to get ready. Anyone can make tea.' Mrs. Robinson had sat down close to the wide fireplace; her face, resting on her two clasped hands, shone whitely against the grey, flickering background formed by the flame and smoke of the log fire, while her fur cape, thrown back, revealed the velvet gown which formed a patch of soft, pure colour in the twilit room.