The golden finger on his bed became a shining lance that struck across to the wall.
There were ivy and a climbing rose about the window through which he looked to the shimmering poplars and the distant hills.

Many birds were singing, and from the direction of the quarters sounded the faint blowing of a horn.

A bee came droning in to the pansies in a bowl.
Rand's dark eyes made a journey through the room, from the flowered curtains to the mandarin on the screen, from the screen to the willowed china and the easy chair, from the chair to the picture of General Washington on the wall, the vases on the mantel-shelf, and the green hemlock branches masking for the summer the fireplace below.

Over all the blue room and the landscape without was a sense of home, of order and familiar sweetness.

It struck to the soul of a too lonely and too self-reliant man.