Only Clover and her mother were at home, Mildred having chaperoned the younger children to a lawn party in the neighborhood.
"It is Jack!" cried Clover before the footstep had reached the steps. She looked hopefully at her mother, who returned the significant gaze.
"He wouldn't whistle," continued the girl with soft eagerness, "if he weren't—if he weren't the same old Jack."
"I hardly feel equal to seeing him to-day," said Mrs. Bryant tremulously.
"You shall not, dear," was the hurried response, as Clover ran downstairs from her mother's room where they had been sitting. She threw open the house door.
"Clover herself," exclaimed the visitor, laughing with pleasure, and wringing her offered hand with painful cordiality.
"I'm glad you've come at last," she answered; "and you don't look sorry."
"Not a bit of it," was the breezy answer. "Where are Mrs. Bryant and Mildred, and the small fry? I want to see everybody."
"The girls and Frank will be inconsolable to miss your first call, but they've gone to a children's party; and mother, I am sorry to say, isn't able to see any one to-day." While the girl spoke, her eyes alternately met Jack's with a sort of wistful gladness, and then fell away. Her face expressed the relief she felt to be thus standing and talking in friendly, easy fashion with her old schoolmate.
"But come in and sit down," she added. "You did not come home at Christmas, so we have a whole year's talking to do."