Page:Conflict (1927).pdf/50



and sunshine, and cold gushing water after steaming hot, always acted like magic on Sheilah's fears. As she stood bare-armed before her mirror the next morning pinning up her hair, she wondered why people talked about feeling out of sorts before breakfast. She thought it was the best time of the whole day. She had forgotten all about her dream. By the time she was seated before the piano in the living-room for her usual half-hour of practicing before breakfast, the fresh morning courage in her heart was circulating through her whole being.

It was a glorious, sparkling morning. Frost on the window-panes, twinkling in the sunshine like sea-sand with lots of mica-like bits in it. Blindingly white outdoors, and cold and brittle; but in here rosy-colored, and warm, and soft. And so goodsmelling! Coffee and bacon! Oh, how good to be alive, on a cold winter morning, in a warm, rosy-colored room; with a beautiful Prelude, which she had worked weeks to conquer, running off her finger-tips like water! Why, of course she hadn't got to marry Felix Nawn! And she pressed down the