Mrs. Alison and Alexander moved through
the great hall and down a corridor to a little parlor that was hers
alone. They entered it. It gave, through an open door and two windows
set wide, upon a small, choice garden and one wide-spreading, noble,
ancient tree. Glenfernie entered as one who knew the place, but upon
whom, at every coming, it struck with freshness and liking. The room
itself was most simple.
"I like," said Alexander, "our spare, clean, precise Scotch parlors.
But this is to me like a fine, small prioress's room in a convent of
learned saints!"
His old friend laughed. "Very little learned, very little saintly, not
at all prior! Let us sit in the doorway, smell the lavender, and hear
the linnets in the tree."
She took the chair he pushed forward. He sat upon the door-step at her
feet.
"Concerning Ian," she said. "What do you make out of it all?"
"I make out that I hope he'll not involve himself in some French and
Tory mad attempt!"
"What do his letters say?"
"They speak by indirection. Moreover, they're at present few and
short.... We shall see when he comes!"
"Do you think that he will tell you all?"
Alexander's gray eyes glanced at her as earlier they had glanced at
Mr. Wotherspoon. "I do not think that we keep much from each other!...
No, of course you are right! If there is anything that in honor he
cannot tell, or that I--with my pledges, such as they are, in another
urn--may not hear, we shall find silences.
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