"Why, yes, if you care to," replied Elizabeth as she and Jean stepped up to the sleigh.
"Father, I've brought my room-mate, Jean Cabot, home with me for the holidays. She expected to go to New York to visit her aunt, but at the last moment she had to give it up, as her aunt was sick. I know you are always glad to welcome one more, so I invited her up here."
"Very glad to know you, Jean. Hope you'll excuse my not getting out to help you," said Dr. Fairfax, "but I'm so bundled up I don't believe I could ever get back again if I once got out. It's been a terribly cold day up our way, and I drove ten miles the other side of our hill before I came down for you. I've been over to Judge Morton's, Elizabeth, to see his mother. She's a pretty sick woman, and I almost doubt if I can pull her through this time."
"Oh, that accounts for Franklin Morton's being at Wilton Junction. What a contemptible snob that fellow is! I've seen him hundreds of times driving through the village, and have known him ever since he first spent his summers at Gorham, but he's never spoken five words to me until to-night when he saw the prospect of meeting Jean. Did you hear him ask if he might call on us? I imagine him in our little farmhouse! Well, I guess we needn't borrow trouble, for he would never come, especially as his grandmother is very sick.
"Now, Father, what about Dick? I hoped he would come down with you to the station."
"Lucky he didn't now, isn't it, Jean, for how could we four have ridden home in this little sleigh? Pretty tight squeeze as it is. To tell you the truth, dear, I'm a little worried about Richard's case, for he doesn't seem to get his strength back as I wish he would. Typhoid does pull any one down so, it's a hard fight to get back again. He's been a wonderfully patient boy through it all, but I think sometimes he gets discouraged about himself, although he never says anything to us. I don't know what he would do without your letters, girl. I verily believe he knows them all by heart, and he talks about your friends there as though they were his own. He'll feel right at home with this young lady here, for next to you, Elizabeth, Jean has been of most interest to him, and he's wondered so many times if he could ever see her.
"Here, Jean, is where we begin to climb our hill at the top of which is our little village. I think now that it has stopped snowing the moon will soon appear, and if it does you will see one of the finest winter pictures I know of. I ride for miles and miles around this whole country, but I know of no more beautiful views than this hill affords us in winter as well as in summer.
"See, there's the moon peeping behind that cloud now."
Slowly the old horse pulled his heavy load up the long hill, and before the ascent was half made the full moon was shining brightly, shedding its beauty over the snow-covered country. Gaunt trees threw long black shadows across the tiny thread of a road, while here and there were deserted buildings almost hidden from view by the great drifts of snow. There was hardly a sound but the tinkle of their own sleigh-bells and the crunching of the runners on the snow. Peace and quiet and beauty were everywhere, as far as the eye could reach.
Jean could hardly believe her eyes. Here was something she had read about but never seen, and the wonder of it threw its spell over her. Indeed, all three became gradually silent, apparently engrossed with their own thoughts, the doctor wondering how his aged patient was rallying under the treatment he had suggested, Elizabeth, deeply troubled by her father's words about her brother, and Jean lost in contemplation of the strange and wonderful scene before her.