Best of all, their father’s state of health had so much improved, during these last few weeks, that the girls could look forward with confidence to his complete restoration, in time, to a really robust condition.
Hillcrest had been his salvation. The sun and air of the mountainside home had finally brought him well on the road to recovery; and the joy his two daughters felt because of this fact can scarcely be expressed in words.
Grandma Castle and the Chadwicks wanted to remain until New Year’s, so the girls got no real vacation. Several automobile parties had now found their way to the house on the hill, and the old-fashioned viands, the huge rooms, open fires, and all the “queer” furniture induced them to return from time to time.
So Lyddy and ’Phemie decided to be prepared for such parties, or for other people who wished to board for a week or so at a time, all winter.
Mr. Bray had grown so much stronger by now that sometimes he expressed his belief that he ought to go back to the shop and earn money, too.
“Wait till next season, Father,” Lydia urged him, softly. “We can all pull together here, and if we have only a measure of good fortune, we shall be independent indeed by next fall.”
The prospect was surely bright–as bright as that which lay before Lyddy and Harris Colesworth one Indian summer day as they strolled down the lane to the highroad.
“I don’t see how Aunt Jane can find this place lonely,” sighed Lyddy, leaning just a little on the young man’s arm, but with her gaze sweeping all the fair mountainside.
“You couldn’t leave it, Lyddy?” he asked, with sudden wistfulness.
“No, indeed! Not for long. No other place would seem like home to me after our experience here. It’s more like home than the house I was born in at Easthampton.