But he was still more concerned in noticing, for the first time, a singular sympathetic understanding of each other, and an odd similarity of occasional action and expression between them.

It was a part of this monstrous peculiarity that neither the sympathy nor the likeness suggested any particular friendship or amity in the pair, but rather a mutual antagonism and suspicion.

Mrs.Peyton, coldly polite to Clarence's former COMPANION, but condescendingly gracious to his present TENANT and retainer, did not notice it, preoccupied with the annoyance and pain of Susy's frequent references to the old days of their democratic equality.
"You don't remember, Jim, the time that you painted my face in the wagon, and got me up as an Indian papoose ?" she said mischievously.
But Jim, who had no desire to recall his previous humble position before Mrs.Peyton or Clarence, was only vaguely responsive.

Clarence, although joyfully touched at this seeming evidence of Susy's loyalty to the past, nevertheless found himself even more acutely pained at the distress it caused Mrs.Peyton, and was as relieved as she was by Hooker's reticence.

For he had seen little of Susy since Peyton's death, and there had been no repetition of their secret interviews.