But Miss Gascoigne had said solemnly that "my poor dear sister always breakfasted at nine, and never allowed her children to breakfast any where but in the nursery." And that reference, which was made many times a day, invariably silenced Christian.
She had now been married exactly four weeks, but it seemed like four years--four ages--as if she hardly remembered the time when she was Christian Oakley.

Yet now and then, in a dim sort of way, her old identity returned to her, as it does to those who, after a great crisis and uprooting of all life, submit, some in despair, some in humble, patience, to the inevitable.
This good time, this lucid interval, so to speak, usually came to her in the morning, when she took her early walk in the familiar places; for to Christian familiarity only made things more dear.

Already she was beginning to find her own nooks, and to go about her own ways in those grim college rooms, which grew less ghostly now that she knew them better.

Already she was getting a little used to her new home, her formal dignities, and her handsome clothes.

It was a small thing to think of, perhaps, and yet, as she walked across the college quadrangles, remembering how often she had shivered in her thin shawl along these very paths, the rich fur cloak felt soft and warm, like her husband's goodness and unfailing love.
As she stepped with her light, firm tread across the crinkling snow, she was--not unhappy.