"That wiggle of his right foot," said Helen, "means that he wants to talk. Oh, we've developed a remarkable code and we've not gone in for the blind raised letters because he never will need them."
She brought a pencil, which she slipped between his fingers, and a pad, which she fixed on a slanting table fastened to the chair.
"He's becoming wonderfully good at it," she said, "though at first he was always getting off the track and writing one line over another."
Slowly but quite clearly he wrote his big letters on small pages, which Helen passed to the father and mother.
"Some family reunion, this! It is a cinch that I get well—father, pardon the language!"
This was the first sheet. The two looked at each other and smiled. "It's Phil, all right!" murmured Peter, echoing their thoughts.
"When I get my new countenance, new eyes and ears, and descend on Longfield, even Jane will admit I'm grown up. I am going to show Hanks that he is not the only one who can branch out"—this on the second sheet.
"Peter arranged it so you could come, I hear," came the third. "Tell him he has been so kind that I almost regret I did not go to work for him and ruin his business."
There was something very like a snort from the direction of Peter, who was caught grinning when the others looked around.
"Tell Bill Hurley, who is for the Allies but a pessimist about their chances, that the Allies are going to win the war. And you are coming often, aren't you? Won't they let you? This conversation is getting one-sided." He pulled up his sleeve, which was a signal to Helen.