Marise said, "Over there, with Paul. I'll go tell them."
She found them both, hand in hand, sitting on the edge of the truck which carried the leather-covered boxes and wicker basket-trunks, bound for Biskra or beyond, or Java; and the square department-store trunk bound for Maple Avenue, Macon, Georgia.
"Mother," said Paul, "Mr. Welles has promised me that he'll come up and visit us summers."
"There's no house in the world where you'll be more welcome," said Marise with all her heart, holding out her hand.
Mr. Welles shook it hard, and held it in both his. As the train whistled screamingly at the crossing, he looked earnestly into her face and tried to tell her something, but the words would not come.
As she read in his pale old face and steady eyes what he would have said, Marise cried out to herself that there do not exist in the world any things more halting and futile than words. She put her arms around his neck and kissed him. "Good-bye, dear Mr. Welles," was all she said, but in the clinging of his old arms about her, and in the quivering, shining face he showed as they moved down the platform together, she knew that he too had not needed words.
Paul clung to his hand till the last moment, gazing up at him constantly, silently. Marise looked down on the little boy's tanned, freckled, sober face and strained, rapidly winking eyes, and had the intuition, "This is one of the moments Paul will never forget. He will always be able to shut his eyes and see this old Don Quixote setting forth." With a rush of her old, jealous, possessive mother-love, she longed to share this with him and to have him know that she shared it; to put her arms around him and make him let her in. But she knew better now. She yearned over him silently, and did not touch him.
"Well, good-bye, Paul," said Mr. Welles, shaking hands with him.
"Well, good-bye," said Paul dryly, setting his jaw hard.
"Oh, this is the day-coach!" cried Eugenia. "Where is the drawing-room car?"