Her chair was just behind the parlour door , and presently Janet Moore and Sylvia Gray came and sat on the stairs in the hall outside , where a cool breeze blew in through the maples before the front door . They were talking of their favourite poets . Janet , it appeared , adored Byron and Scott . Sylvia leaned to Tennyson and Browning . `` Do you know , '' said Sylvia softly , `` my father was a poet ? He published a little volume of verse once ; and , Janet , I 've never seen a copy of it , and oh , how I would love to ! It was published when he was at college -- just a small , private edition to give his friends . He never published any more -- poor father ! I think life disappointed him . But I have such a longing to see that little book of his verse . I have n't a scrap of his writings . If I had it would seem as if I possessed something of him -- of his heart , his soul , his inner life . He would be something more than a mere name to me . '' `` Did n't he have a copy of his own -- did n't your mother have one ? '' asked Janet . `` Mother had n't . She died when I was born , you know , but Aunty says there was no copy of father 's poems among mother 's books . Mother did n't care for poetry , Aunty says -- Aunty does n't either . Father went to Europe after mother died , and he died there the next year . Nothing that he had with him was ever sent home to us .
He had sold most XXXXX his books before he went , but he gave a few of his favourite ones to Aunty to keep for me .
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