“I wish one of you fellows would kindly stop at the stable and send round a cab. It is too late for my mother to go back to town in the car.”
A protest from Mrs. Dawson seemed imminent, but she apparently thought better of it and returned to the book.
The getting away was difficult, but not nearly so difficult as staying any longer would have been. They chirped “goodbyes,” and “get well soons,” and “so glad to have met yous,” galore, and Bigelow felt waxing within him a new and passionate love for his own family, who were all decently dead. Then they echoed off through a long corridor. After they had gone Mrs. Dawson said nothing for several minutes, and Dickey made a noise with the fire.
“They’re queer young men,” she finally reflected aloud. “Do you like them very much, Richard?”
“Oh, yes,” answered Dickey, indifferently, “you get to like people you see a great deal, I imagine.” He sat on the arm of his mother’s chair and held one of his mother’s hands and kissed it.
“I wonder if you get to dislike people you don’t see much of,” said Mrs. Dawson. She was turning the leaves of her book without stopping to look at them.
“Not if you ever truly loved them,” answered Dickey, tenderly drawing nearer to her and laying his cheek against hers. He was almost overdoing the thing.
“Not if you ever truly loved them, I suppose,” thoughtfully repeated his mother with more intelligence than Dickey had ever given her credit for.
Then she began to turn the leaves of the book all over again.