Page:Elizabeth Jordan--Tales of the cloister.djvu/30

 She fancied that few heard him laugh like that now. She wondered why.

Of course he would not remember her, or, if he did, he would not recognize her in this silent nun, wrapped in the dignified trappings of her order. She had not seen her own face for many years, save in the absurdly tiny mirror before which the sisters arranged their veils; but she knew that she was much changed. He would not see in this delicate woman with the hectic flush on her cheeks the Diana he had known in the old days, and whom he had petted and loved as a younger sister. It was very pleasant to see him again and to get through him this vivid aftermath of life at home. She smiled contentedly as she dwelt on it. That was why she had so suddenly recalled the forgotten incident of Jack's feat. Arthur had been camping with him on that occasion. The memory banished that night the legion of ghouls that had been haunting her pillow so long. She and Jack and Arthur Varick lived over the past until she fell asleep and went back to the scenes of her childhood in the first untroubled slumber she had had for a longer time than she dared confess even to herself.

In a period of depression she had found a new friend, or, rather, an old friend had come