had seen a vision. She got up wondering why he had come that way. Had he walked from the town just to get the view from that point? In any case, he knew it and wanted something from it and he had been irritated to find an interloper there. She would have felt just the same. When she reached the road there was no sign of him. He had been swallowed up in the night.
III
Valerie looked out of her window at the river the next morning and revolted swiftly and completely against the idea of work.
“I’ll do it to-night,” she said to herself.
“Lizzie, would it be possible for me to have a few sandwiches? I want to take my lunch and go off for a picnic. I could make them here at the table if I could have some cold meat.” She looked up at the waitress with a half-humorous, half-pleading appeal, as if she knew she were asking an outrageous thing but could not help it.
“Why, I will make you some sandwiches, miss. It isn’t a busy morning. There’s some nice cold beef, and do you like tomato sauce on it?”
“Yes, I do. That’s fine. And ask Michael to get me a bottle of ale.”
She turned to Father Ryan.
“I’m going to play truant,” she said gleefully, “and have a lovely day all to myself. I get awfully sick of people, don’t you?”
“One needs a rest from them, I think, to restore one’s forces.”
“Well, it’s more than that. I like myself.”
“You have every reason to, I’m sure,” he smiled gallantly.
