Page:Elizabeth Jordan--Tales of the cloister.djvu/231

 she gave a little gasp of satisfaction, and made two or three notes. Her dream, if a perplexing psychical freak, had proved a profitable aid, and it was sweet to have dreamed of Sister Estelle as coming to her in her need.

A wave of perfume—sweet, heavy, full of memories, was borne in upon her sense. She looked up wonderingly and inhaled it deeply. The air was perfumed richly with mignonette. There was none in the room, none on the desk, none in the old note-book she was reading. No mignonette was near her that cold December day.

She went to the window and leaned forth. The perfume failed her utterly. It did not come from without. From somewhere in her room it rose in such a whiff as she had not known for years. There had been a great bed of it in the convent garden; it was Sister Estelle's favorite flower.

Sister Estelle's favorite flower!

Dr. Van Nest's heart gave a great leap. The perfume was still with her and around her. Her nostrils and lungs were full of it—as full as they had been the day Sister Estelle had been laid away in a grave which the doctor's own hands had lined with the simple flower the dead nun loved.