“Yes.”
She said no more, for she was not yet ready to have him recognize her. Besides, in the dim light she might have made a mistake. Watching his chance until there was absolutely no one in sight of the building, the young man at last gave the word.
Julia’s gymnasium practice was of great service to her now. Opening the window wider, she sat for a minute on the sill. Then as she put her foot on Philip’s shoulder, by an adroit movement she maintained her balance while he knelt low enough to permit her to jump to the ground.
In a second she was on her feet, and no one but Philip had perceived her strange exit from the building.
Her hat had fallen off, receiving the full force of the jar of reaching the ground; and Philip, turning to speak to her, was amazed to find that it was Julia whom he had assisted. He gave ready answers to her questions, wondering that she did not know of his intended return.
“I haven’t heard from Edith lately,” said Julia, “and we have all been so busy with the mid-years that we might have failed to hear an even greater piece of news than your coming, although this really is very important,” she hastened to add, lest Philip should think her altogether ungracious. “It’s nearly three years since you went away,” she continued after a moment’s silence.
“Is it? But tell me, Julia, how did you manage to shut yourself up in the Library? Is it the fashion for Radcliffe girls to do that kind of thing now? In my day you used to be more conventional. But we must hurry to a car, you are hungry.”
“Oh, indeed I am not,” returned Julia. “Please let us walk—that is, if you have time. They must have finished dinner at Mrs. Colton’s half an hour ago, and I’d so much rather know what you have been doing these three years. I have only heard general rumors from Edith and the others.”
So Philip, nothing loath, gave her a glowing account of life on the ranch, of the various people he had met and the things he had learned. “It was harder sometimes than studying,” he said, “the life out there. But it did me good, and now I’m going to work in a different way. I’ve promised my father to work for my degree. What a fool I was to cut those examinations! I’ll have a good half-year’s work to make them up. But I may have time for a little law, too; I’ve promised my father to try for the bar. Even if I do not practise, it will be a good foundation for business. The old gentleman rather wants me to look after things and relieve him.”
Mr. Blair had never been considered an overworked man, and Julia smiled at the thought of Philip’s relieving him. But Philip to-day was evidently very different from the Philip of three years before. He no longer spoke in a drawl and the note of personal vanity was lacking. When they reached Mrs. Colton’s, Philip went indoors with Julia, and Ruth was louder than Julia had been in her expressions of surprise at his return to Cambridge. He told the story of the rescue in a fashion that was amusing, if embarrassing to Julia. Looking at him as he sat by the droplight in Mrs. Colton’s library, she could see that he had grown stouter and browner, and that no one could now accuse him of looking too effeminate.