Page:Stella Dallas, a novel (IA stelladallasnove00prou).pdf/151

Rh It was soon discovered at the working-girls' home that Mrs. Morrison possessed rare genius with girls. She knew just how to approach them—just how to talk with them. She could hold the attention of a whole roomful of factory hands reading poetry—Browning and Whitman—out loud to them, and telling them what it meant to her. She could interest a dozen lively little errand girls for an hour at a time, gathered around an ant-hill in operation, at the edge of one of her garden-paths at her summer place on Long Island. Frequently she had groups from the Home come out from the city during the summer, and spend a day with her in her garden, among the illuminating bugs and bees and flowers.

Helen Morrison usually talked with her working-girls in groups. She seldom came in contact with the girls individually. That was probably why they failed to satisfy her, why they remained, always, simply a worthy charity dedicated to the memory of the little girl beside her bed. It wasn't until Laurel came to spend a week with Helen Morrison that she felt the same heart-string, which Carol had pulled so hard once long ago, gently touched again. It hurt a little at first—brought back the old pain. But it also brought back a little timid thrill of the old joy and ecstasy.

There was something of the same pristine beauty about Laurel at thirteen as about her own child's crystallized innocence. There were areas in Laurel's soul, big white expanses, untouched by experience, unsullied by life. It was almost as if those parts of Laurel had disappeared into a picture also, when she, too, was just learning to walk alone.