"Did you see my husband in the station, Mary?" mother asked, when I had brought the tea, and put it in front of Mary, and she had begun to sip.
Mary gave a sorrowful glance up in mother's face.
"Yes," she said; "I saw him at the further end of the platform. I didn't stop to speak to him, and he didn't see me. I thought I'd come here first."
Mother made no answer, and showed no haste to know why, and I felt half wild with impatience: yet I had just to go on drying the cups and saucers, for mother went back to her washing, and kept handing them to me. I couldn't think why mother didn't at least just ask if anything was wrong with Walter. But I didn't dare ask it myself.
"My husband has a lot to do to-day—all these excursion trains," mother said. "It's on account of the races."
"I came by an excursion train," says Mary.
"They don't all stop here, but some do," says mother. "He's got a deal to see to, and won't be in till dinner-time."
"No," Mary said, in a dreamy-like tone.
She was getting near the end of the last slice, and I watched her, as greedy as could be for her to have done, that I might hear what she had to say.
"Another slice, Mary?" says mother.