The work done, she would go for the bracing walk along the banks of the Seine before the dusk fell in tender greys upon the quays of the city. Or the Foolish Virgins, one or several, would call up into the twilight, whooping her down from her high lodgment, and take her for a ramble along the quays or into the elaborately planned wildness of the city’s woods, or straight across the river into the boulevards with their glitter and colour and the shops of fashion; or away up to the heights of Montmartre they would step it, climbing the steep streets to look down upon the city, and home again, loitering before print-shops and places where they sell artistic things. And the “boys” would always halt before the _modes_, that Betty might have a good hint of the fashion--they were proud of her beauty, proud of her comradeship. Babette, too, would come, and, as they went, talk her genial frank talk, full of shrewd observation and worldly wisdom. Bartholomew Doome, too, more than once, had been of the party--another Doome, without a hint of sin upon his lips, a strange Doome who was without pose, devoid of Byronic gloom, lacking as to insincerities, a Doome who spoke tenderly of children and showed intimate and wondrous knowledge of their ways--altogether an astounding strange Doome. Noll, only, was now too often absent. He had other things to do--had “something on”--urgent nothings amongst the nobodies. It is the busy people that find time to do everything--but to be wholly idle. The idle it is that have no leisure to be anything but idle. Indeed, Betty was busy enough in these days. It came as an instinct that she should be the healer. As a wounded child, with confident appeal, looks to the grown-up to banish pain, so such as were in distress plucked at Betty’s sleeve asking comfort. When a student lay dying, he would always send for Betty--when one raved in restless delirium of fever it was Betty that sat writing by the bed and brought gentleness into the harsh atmosphere--it was to Betty’s discreet ears that was unfolded the long-hidden tangle of the secret man, the struggle of the troubled soul flinching from the cowardice of its own shabby reservations--Betty’s hands that quieted the restless brain, and her calm command that brought back honour. Her dear ears were shut to all strange peevishness or conceit that the unmasked egoist unconsciously uttered. Her presence cleansed the talk, her sweet humour raised the clean laugh, her intelligence roused the sense of dignity, and the gaiety of her fresh young vigorous womanhood made of the sickroom a pleasaunce, and of the world outside a garden of fragrant blossom. And Babette, who was fellow conspirator in her offices, and hung upon her ordering, though she had a gossip tongue, knew no English. CHAPTER LX _Wherein Betty feels the Keen Breath of Winter_