“Well, she came on the first train she possibly could have come on after sending the telegram, and I knew her at once. She was the very last person to get out of the car. It wasn’t that, or because she looked different—anybody else would have said she was very, very tired; but I just knew her, and before I could think of any of those other things, I took her travelling-bag and said,—
“‘I’m one of Hugh’s friends.’
“I didn’t see her when I said it,—only her hands,—because I was looking down at the bag.” Haydock paused a moment.
“I think it was the right thing, dear—the only one,” said his mother, softly.
“It’s a long, long drive to Cambridge, even if you know where you are all the time. But with the windows all blurred, and nothing to mark the way except the rumble of the bridge or the car-tracks, or some bright light you know pretty well, that tells you you haven’t gone nearly so far as you thought you had, it’s terrible. We didn’t say anything on the way. She leaned back in the corner; I think she was crying. Mrs. Finley—the landlady—heard us coming, and had the door open when we got out; I made her go upstairs with me, and told her not to dare to go near that room and—and disturb them. She’s just the sort of a woman who would. It was almost midnight then, and I sat there until after two. I tried to grind for a Fine Arts’ examination out of one of Wellington’s books—he must have been taking the same course—until the door downstairs opened and closed, and I heard Mrs. Wellington come slowly up the steps. I put the book on the mantelpiece; it seemed heartless to be reading there by his fire when she came in.
“She was a very brave woman, I think—brave and civilised. She walked slowly round the room, sort of touching things here and there; and she stopped a long time at the table, and put her hand on the note-books gently, as if she were stroking them, and then closed them.”
“Did she find the letter?” asked Mrs. Haydock.
“No, I gave that to her later on—I had it in my pocket then. I didn’t want her to find it herself; it always makes you jump so to see your own name written out, when you’re not looking for it. Then she sat down in a chair near me and stared at the fire. I asked her if she wanted me to go away; and she said, no, she was glad I was there. We talked a little—I couldn’t say much; my position was queer you know—not what she thought it was. But it didn’t seem wrong as long as I stayed just because she wanted me to, and I hated to spoil it by saying things that couldn’t ring true. She talked about Hugh in such a quiet wonderful way that every now and then I found myself wondering if she really knew. Sometimes she doubted it herself, I think, for she left me twice and went slowly downstairs as if she wanted to make sure. When daylight came, she went in and lay down on his bed. I put out the lamps and wrote a note saying where my room was if she wanted to send for me.
“At breakfast I got hold of Bradley and Sears Wolcott and Billy and four or five other fellows, and told them they simply had to go round there at noon, and that some of them would have to go into the station with me. They didn’t see any particular reason for it at first; most of them were grinding for the exams, and Sears had an engagement to play court tennis and lunch at the B. A. A. He said he didn’t see why the man’s friends weren’t enough without dragging out a lot of heelers who’d never heard of him, let alone never having met him. He wasn’t ‘going to be any damned hired crocodile!’ he said. You see, they couldn’t understand that if they didn’t go, there probably wouldn’t be anybody there but the preacher and Mrs. Finley, and those horrible men with the black satin ties and cotton gloves who carry you in and out when there’s no one else round to do it. But they all came at last—even Sears, grumbling till he got inside the gate. Nate brought three or four fellows round from his club, and an armful of red and white roses ‘from the class,’ he told Mrs. Wellington. It was a nice little lie. I was surprised that Natey thought of it. The Regent came, and Mr. Barrows, the college secretary, and poor old Miss Shedd, Wellington’s washwoman. She was awfully cut up, poor old thing, and made it as bad as possible for everybody. That was about all, I think. Plummer, the college preacher, was simple and manly; Heaven knows he couldn’t very well have been anything else under the circumstances. And then we had that interminable drive again, back to Boston.
“I was in the carriage with Mrs. Wellington. Any of us could have gone with her just as well, I suppose, because we were all Hugh’s friends, although I was the only one who knew that we were. But I wanted to ride with her somehow, and I’m glad now that I did, for a very queer thing happened; I’ve never quite understood it. She didn’t say anything for ever so long, not until we got across the bridge and the carriage began to go slower. Then she put one of her hands on mine, and said,—