'Is it you, Tom!' cried Ethel. 'Notice or no notice, we are glad of you. But what is the matter?'
'Where's my father?'
'Coming. Charles Cheviot took him down to look at one of the boys. Is there anything the matter?' she added, after a pause.
'No, nothing.'
'You look very odd,' added Gertrude.
He gave a nervous laugh. 'You would look odd, if you had travelled all night.'
They commented, and began to tell home news; but Ethel noted that he neither spoke nor heard, only listened for his father. Gertrude grew tired of inattentive answers, and said she should go and dress. Ethel was turning to follow, when he caught hold of her cloak, and drew her close to him. 'Ethel,' he said, in a husky, stifled voice, 'do you know this?'
On her knees, by the red fire-light, she saw the 'L. A. Ward,' and looked up. 'Is it?' she said. He bowed his head.
And then Ethel put her arm round his neck, as he knelt down by her; and he found that her tears, her rare tears, were streaming down, silent but irrepressible. She had not spoken, had asked no question, made no remark, when Dr. Mays entrance was heard, and she loosed her hold on her brother, out without rising from the floor, looked up from under the shade of her hat, and said, 'O, papa! it is found, and he has done it! Look there!'
Her choked voice, and tokens of emotion, startled the Doctor; but Tom, in a matter-of-fact tone, took up the word: 'How are you, father?—Yes. I have only met with this little memorandum.'