"I don't like leaving home. Suppose she's ill and sends a wire, or . . ."
The front door bell rang and I saw Gran'pa go a shade paler and hold his breath. I, too, had the sense of something ominous in the air.
A few seconds later Nanny entered the room and announced:
"Miss Froud!"
There was a dramatic silence; and then Gran'pa suddenly thrust Nanny gently aside, strode out into the hall, and took his beloved in his arms.
I caught sight of her face through the chink in the door. It was raised to his, and if ever a man read a message in a woman's eyes, Gran'pa did at that divine moment of ecstasy.
"After half a century!" I thought. "America and England. . . . Hands across the sea! . . . Love is deathless, indeed . . . !"
[CHAPTER XI]
THE GORILLA COUNTRY
Sally Rebecca having at last surrendered, Gran'pa became his usual energetic self again, and in no more than three days after that touching scene in the hall we were ready to set sail for Africa.