“But did you look at the real article up above us?” questioned Jacóbus.
“No,” admitted Mevrouw Mopius, “I didn’t think of that.”
Harriet rose hurriedly from dessert. “Aunt is tired,” she said. “You must excuse us, uncle,” and she offered Mevrouw her arm. At the door she turned. “You don’t want me just now, I suppose?” she continued. “I am going out to get a breath of fresh air.”
“Yes,” added Ursula quickly, “Harriet and I are going for a walk.”
A moment later the two girls met on the bedroom-landing. Both were dressed to go out. Harriet had a white feather on her hat, and a red shawl over one arm. “Leave me alone, can’t you?” said Harriet. She spoke fiercely, and a gesture escaped her which was almost a menace.
“No, I’m going with you,” replied Ursula, quietly.
“Indeed you sha’n’t. What a fool I was to tell you. Women always are fools to ask sympathy from each other.”
“I shall not be in your way,” persisted Ursula, with coaxing decision. “Let me wait with you till he comes, if he comes, and then I can step aside.”
“Of course he will come,” said Harriet. Perhaps it was the thought of this certain triumph which induced her to forbear all further opposition to Ursula’s accompanying her.
“I bought this shawl,” began Harriet, as they walked through the shadowed streets. “I had to pawn my only brooch to get it.”
“Does uncle allow you no pocket-money?” asked Ursula.
“Ten florins a month,” replied Harriet, bitterly. “I spend most of it in scents and chocolate-creams. They are my one consolation. I adore chocolate-creams. Do you? We might get some now. I’ve got a florin left from the brooch-money.”
“Let me buy them this time,” suggested Ursula, sympathetically.
It was still light, but a veil had already fallen over the low-sinking sun. The hot, sleepy streets were waking up in the red glow of the fading day. People in the town, now that the glare had died from their eyes, were telling each other that the air was cool, and trying to believe it.
Outside, however, the assertion had more truth in it. A ripple of refreshment was slowly spreading up from the distant river. The shadows of the straight-lined trees lay across the brick road in great black stripes. The fields looked as if their dusty grass was turning green again beneath the darkening sky; in the dull ditches stood the cattle, dreamily content.