Note 13 — Chapter Eight
Reading edition
Possibly Henriette was plain in appearance. To know her was never to think one way or another about how she looked. It was what she looked. And what she looked was all the calm competence in the world. Henriette was calm competence. A woman with a rare gift of knowing how to bide her time. How frequently and with what success, in the turbulent, stirring years that were to fall our lot, she imbued members of our family with some of that secret of hers, I shall not take time to record.... Suffice it to say that what this powder-dry little lady taught us out of her innate culture of mind and spirit, her wisdom-before-the-event, and her incalculable power of patience, no Schuyler can ever repay.