With the Grand Duke's cry of "My son! My son!" as our only answer, we bowed our way through the doorway and entered the car which was still chug-chugging away at the door, the tired Jap boy asleep at the wheel. It was very dark when we resumed our journey, which was quickly at an end. Two miles from Dhalmatia we turned through a high stone archway of a private estate and came to Castle Framkor.
It was too dark for me to see anything of the outside of the castle except the porte-cochère, under which we stopped, and the open front door from which the servants trooped with cries of welcome. If there was a similarity about the entrance there was none in the spirit of the two castles.
A tri-colour collie dog was the first to greet us. He ran wildly about the car barking at the engines and sniffing at the visitors. He recognized the General and tried to get into the seat with him.
"Down, Laddie; down, sir," commanded his master as he sprang to the ground, to be overwhelmed by the excited dog, which leaped against his shoulder and tried to caress his face.
Willing hands opened the tonneau door and Nick and I descended. The dog sniffed at our legs and growled at us. Smiling women servants gathered around the master while the men, in obedience to his commands, carried our trunks and hand luggage into the hall.
"Welcome home to Framkor, Nicholas," cried the General. It was the first word he had spoken since his farewell speech at Dhalmatia. But all his gloom had left him.
Nicholas made no reply. Not a single servant knew him and no one welcomed him back to his own home. While it was indeed a splendid homecoming for the General, I pitied Nick and realized what he had been sacrificing all his life for the sake of his country. It is one thing to choose a vocation for yourself and quite another to have some one choose it for you.
The hall room was comfortably warmed by an open grate fire which burned under the mantelpiece. Above hung a full length picture of a man about the General's age in scarlet regimentals. He bore a striking resemblance to Nick.
"That's dad," said the boy as we gathered round the fire to drive out the cold of the night. He looked long and earnestly upon his father's portrait. What moody thoughts were passing in his mind I could not imagine. But the sternness of the pictured face was reflected in the living one beneath.
"What we need most of all is dinner," said the General.