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 over the staircase leading to Mrs. Andrews's domain and called, in the loud, falsely cheerful voice which the heartbroken can summon for emergencies, that she had already had her tea, thank you, and would go immediately to bed. Mrs. Andrews had thought Lanice was going to Hopkinton with Pauline; she began to protest that her room, although papered, was not yet put in order.

'I'll do that. Don't come up,' urged Lanice. For the moment it seemed to her the most important thing in life to keep Mrs. Andrews in her own confines. Nothing should now balk Lanice in her sorrow.

She lighted a lamp and set it on the bureau. The tight nosegays on the new paper pleased her and she immediately began to plan curtains and chintz covers. The presence of the paper-hangers was evident. A stepladder shrouded in the big cloth with which Mrs. Andrews had protected the furniture loomed ghostly by the washstand. The room smelled of damp plaster and of paste, slightly of tobacco, too. Lanice looked at herself questioningly in the familiar glass. Had Anthony Jones marked her face as surely as her soul? She looked tired and years older than she had ever seen herself before. Sighing, she turned to her bed and folded back the covers and opened the lavender-scented linen sheets. She had longed for this room for four days, hoping that she might be alone and permitted to cry unrestrainedly. Now she listlessly drew off her clothes, slipped into bed, and, sighing, fell asleep.

The Park Street Church clock struck two and