CHAPTER XXIII
In temporary relaxation from the stress of that mood she was glad to see her friend Major Darrett.
He did not suggest the woe of the world. Because the big new things had become
—for the moment, at least—too much for her, there was rest in the shelter of the small familiar things.
So much of the unknown had been beating against her that she was glad for a little laughing respite in the known.
He stood for a world she knew how to deal with. In that he seemed to offer shelter; not that he would be able to do it for long.
He always roused a particular imp in Katie which wanted to be flirtatious. She found now, with a certain relief, that the grave things of life had not exterminated that imp. She would scarcely have felt acquainted with herself had it perished.
And becaus
