And when someone said, "Heard from your son yet, Mr. Adams?" he could only make a negative gesture.
"If there isn't some word of Cary Adams soon, his father will never live to welcome him home," said Madam Royall to her daughter. "He grows thinner every day. What a perfect Godsend Doris has been!"
Madam Royall was hale and hearty though she had lived through many sorrows.
The coveted news came first from Betty. She had written a letter to send by a private messenger, and opened it to add this postscript:
"Mr. Bowen is waiting for this letter. Mr. King has just come in with the news that two ships have arrived at Portsmouth. Among the officers is 'Lieutenant Cary Adams.' That is all we know."
"Oh, Uncle Win!" Doris' eyes swam in tears of joy. "Read Betty's postscript." Then she ran out of the room and had a good cry by herself, though why anyone should want to cry over such joyful news she could not quite understand.
Afterward she tied on her hat and ran over to Madam Royall's and then up to Sudbury Street. For in those days people were wont to say to their neighbors, "Come, rejoice with me!"
When she returned home the house was very quiet. Solomon came and rubbed against her in mute inquiry. No one was in the study. She went out to the kitchen.
"Don't disturb your uncle, Doris," said Miss Recompense. "The news quite overcame him. He has gone to lie down."
After dinner she went out again for some lessons. Oh, how bright the world looked, though it was a day in later March, but the wind had a Southern softness. Soon the wild flowers would be out. There was a very interesting new study, botany, that the previous autumn had taken groups of girls out in the lanes and fields, and some had ventured to visit the Botanic Gardens at Harvard University. Doris was much interested in it.