It was towards the close of a very warm day in August when she returned. Mick brought her back from the station in triumph. He was a very quiet young fellow, and Chris was his favourite sister. He had missed her, more than he cared to say. Barbara welcomed her home with open arms, and Chris seemed as delighted to be back, as she had been to go. She was brimming over with talk, and had gained an indescribable sort of society air which amused her sister. But Barbara soon found that Chris had come home absolutely heart-whole.
"It is only in story books," she confided to Barbara, when they were alone, "that country girls go away from home for three weeks, and meet their fate in that prescribed time. I have thoroughly enjoyed myself, but have seen no one that has taken the slightest liking to me, nor I to them."
"We were wondering—" Barbara began, then hesitated. "Did you like Dr. Fergusson, Chris?"
Chris looked at her sister, then laughed.
"Oh, you dear old thing, is that what you were getting into your head? I shouldn't say that the doctor is in the least, a marrying man. He is so—what shall I say?—self-reliant and self-contained. Awfully nice, and considerate and respectful to all women, which is not the fashion with younger men nowadays. But his heart—if he has one—is wrapped round with a stout substantial crust of stolid indifference and unimpressionability! I should say he was interested in women as fellow-creatures, but he never individualises them any more than he would his patients."
She said much the same to Jean, and laughed at Jean's pertinacious questions.
"Why do you like Scotland so much?" she asked in her turn.
And Jean flushed, and was more wary in her catechism afterwards. Then they slipped into the old routine, except that Jean persisted in lightening Chris of some of her labours.
"I never knew how much you did, till you went away," she said. "I have always been too self-indulgent; it will do me such a lot of good, to work a little."
"But you have your painting. You have quite neglected it, since I have been away."