"Hello!" It was Priscilla's voice. "Don't tell me I'm the first one."
"The others will be here in a minute," Ruth replied in an even voice. "Come right in and take off your coat, Priscilla, for this room's awfully warm."
Priscilla complied with her friend's suggestion, and glanced at her admiringly. She thought she had never seen Ruth look so pretty. "You've got a lovely color to-night," she exclaimed.
"It's just because it's so hot here. I always get flushed when I'm warm."
Priscilla was looking around the room as if in search of something. "Why, where's Nelson?"
"He'll be here right away. You know there are always so many things to be attended to in the last few minutes." But though Ruth gave this explanation with a matter-of-fact cheerfulness that deceived even Priscilla who knew her so well, she was seething inwardly. So this was all he cared. He had sacrificed their quiet hour together. Now there would be a crush and a crowd and everybody talking at once, and no chance to say any of the things she had saved up for their last evening.
Not that she cared. Ruth flung up her head and laughed gaily at something Priscilla was telling. Her hands were cold and her mouth felt very dry, and her heart was pounding furiously. Nelson could come when he was ready, and so that he didn't miss the train, it made no difference to her.
Amy and Bob were next to arrive. Then came Peggy and Graham. "Nelson's late, isn't he?" said Peggy with an uneasy glance at the clock. "He hasn't any time to spare."
"I'll put on my things so we'll all be ready to start when he gets here," Ruth returned casually. She had put on a little blue frock, of which Nelson was especially fond, for the last evening, and she was glad to conceal it by a long coat. Her hand trembled as she pinned her hat in place. She hoped Nelson Hallowell wasn't conceited enough to suppose she cared whether he came at one hour or another.
It was twenty minutes past nine when Nelson arrived, and he looked rather white and shaken. As he had left for camp two years before, his mother had stood smiling in the doorway to watch him go. When it was whispered that they were going across, and he had told her she was not likely to see him again till the war was over, she had kissed him with lips that did not tremble. But then she had been lifted above herself by the exalted spirits of the times. Now she had no sense of patriotic service to sustain her. She realized that she was no longer a young woman, that life was uncertain, and that her boy was going very far away. Over their last meal together she had broken down, and wept as Nelson had never seen his mother weep in all his life.