"Then I shall be better. I'm glad I'm at home again." "So am I. I didn't like him, Terry." "I like him very much." "I mean, I didn't like him for you, and I feel--I feel as if you've escaped out of an ogre's castle!" "Ah, if he had been more ogreish, I might have stayed for the fun of it. Let's thank God he is just a man." The ministrations of an adoring family speedily cured Theresa without a doctor's help, and a few days after her return Neville appeared as emissary of Simon Smith. "We want you to come back," he said. "I don't think Mrs. Morton would consider it etiquette. Of course I'll come, Jack. When?" He stroked his chin. "Well, we haven't given the present good person notice yet. She got the post through sheer force of character, for we both hated her at sight. There'll be a difficulty in turning her out. The old gentleman is afraid to do it, and I tell him it's not my business. It will come to writing her a note and enclosing a cheque during the Easter holidays." "What's the matter with her?" "Oh, she's horrid. I let her have the office to herself. The old gentleman is certainly a sportsman. He just gave a nod when I carried my things into his room. Ah well, trouble has drawn us more closely together!" "Does she do her work properly?" "I don't know! Oh yes, I suppose she does, in a mechanical kind of way. We don't let her go outside the house. You know, you have a spark of genius, Theresa, and you've spoilt us." "Anybody could do what I did, if they used my methods." "I don't believe it; but what are they?" She shook her head. "I'm trying to forget them." "Then you'll be no further use to us." "Yes, I shall. I'm not so limited as that. Jack, why do you love your work?" "I don't know. I can't help loving it." "For its own sake?" "I imagine so." "That's what I'm going to do." "Didn't you?" "No." "Why, then?" "Chiefly for mine, but not altogether--not nearly altogether. I am not made of stone, but I have eyes that are turned inwards. A mental squint!" "It never showed." She laughed. "Oh, I'm an expert in my profession, but I'm very sick of it, so don't say nice things to me. Don't help me to think about myself." He raised his brows in a comical dubiety. "This sounds a little morbid." "And I want to think it's the beginning of health." She turned quietly to stand by the window, and as she looked out on the street, where spring was coming, he found a new dignity in her pose, one born of some dignity of the mind, and her thinness, the manner in which her hand hung by her side, something in the lift of her head, impressed him with a sense of pathos hitherto alien to his thoughts of her. Yet, when she faced him, she was vivid again, and sparkling. He noticed how the words seemed to come upon her lips before she spoke them. "You'll tell me when you have evicted the lady?"