"I hope that Hitchcock won't show up," exclaimed Nelson apprehensively.
Ruth laughed. "No, I don't think Horace expects to honor us. Isn't it the queerest thing," she added, "what Priscilla can see in him?"
"I should say so. Priscilla's one of the finest girls you'd meet in a day's journey, and Hitchcock is a nut. I shouldn't think she could stand it to have him around. Though I suppose," concluded Nelson with customary modesty, "that Priscilla thinks just the same about you and me."
"Priscilla! She wouldn't dare." Ruth's indignation was so intense that Nelson shouted with laughter, but it warmed his heart, nevertheless.
In that last quick-moving Saturday, Ruth saw Nelson for a few moments in the morning, and again about three in the afternoon. His stay was short and rather unsatisfactory for he had some last errands to attend to, and his mind was so full of them that his thoughts wandered from what he was saying, and he left his sentences unfinished in the most irritating fashion.
After he had answered a question of Ruth's in a way which showed he had hardly heard what she had said, he looked up quickly at her half-vexed exclamation, laughed, and jumped to his feet.
"It's no use, Ruth," he said. "I'm one of the fellows who's good for only one thing at a time. I'll attend to these thousand-and-one things that have been left over, and I'll see you about eight o 'clock to-night. That will give us time for a nice little visit."
Up till that time the hours had fairly flown. Now they dragged. Ruth watched the clock and waited for the tiresome, leisurely hour hand to point to eight. The clan was to gather at a little after nine, and she was thankful when Graham departed for Peggy's shortly after finishing dinner. Peggy would keep him till the last minute. Peggy would understand. Ruth had taken great pains in dusting the living-room that morning, and she looked around it thinking that it made a picture of cosy comfort Nelson might be glad to carry with him.
It was eight o'clock at last. Ruth straightened a book on the table, brushed a speck of dust from her gown, and sat down facing the door. There were quick steps on the side walk, and she never doubted that they would come on up the walk, and then up the steps, and she meant to have the door open before he had time to ring. But the footsteps went on and the minute hand of the clock was also moving.
At quarter past eight Ruth was nervous. She got up and down, adjusted the window shades, changed the arrangement of the chairs, fussed with the flowers on the mantel, looked at herself in the mirror, and did something to her hair. At half past eight she sat very still, frowning slightly and biting her lip. At quarter of nine her cheeks had reddened and she tapped the carpet with the toe of her shoe. And at nine o'clock her heart gave a jump and she forgot how near she had come to being angry. For the footsteps for which she had waited were coming up the walk.