The hoary truth is that as Bowlder drew near his home, he had so far conquered his sense of abandonment that he wasn't even thinking of his wife. He was plodding along in the middle of the street for fear of footpads, whom he fancied might be sauntering in the shadows on either side, and was really in quite a happy, fortunate frame of mind. As Bowlder turned in toward his door he was softly repeating the lines:
“'Tis sweet to hear the watch dog's honest bark,
Bay deep-mouthed welcome as we draw near home,
'Tis sweet to know there is an eye will mark
Our coming, and grow brighter when we come.”
Not that Bowlder had a watch dog, honest or otherwise, to bay him deep-mouthed welcome. And inasmuch as they had discharged the exile from Erin, who aforetime did service as the Bowlder maid-of-all-work, when Mrs. B. took flight for the summer, there was slight hope of an eye on the premises to grow brighter when he came.
No; it was not that Bowlder was really looking for deep-mouthed bays or brightening eyes; he was naturally musical and poetical, and the drinks he had corralled had unlocked his nature in that behalf. Bowlder was reciting the lines quoted for the pleasure he drew from their beauty; not from the prophecy they put forth of any meeting to which he looked forward. A remark which escaped Bowlder as he climbed his steps and dexterously fitted his night key to the day keyhole showed this.
“I ought to have stayed at a hotel,” said Bowlder. “There's nobody here to rake me over the coals for it, and I'm going to have a great head on me when I wake up.”
Bowlder at last by mistake got his latchkey into the keyhole to which it related, and the door swung inward. This was a distinct success and Bowlder heaved a breath of relief. This door, which had grown singularly obdurate since Mrs. B.'s departure, had been known to hold Bowlder at bay for twenty minutes.
Bowlder had just cast his hat on the hall floor—he intended to hang it up in the morning when he would have more time—and got as far on a journey to the second story as one step, when a noise in the basement dining-room enlisted Bowlder's attention. His curiosity rather than his fears was aroused; another happy effect of his libations.