"Hurry Frank," said the lady, "he does not yet recognize you Phebe."
"Willie, dear brother Willie!" she called out as the carriage drew up before the gate, and in a moment she had darted down by his side, and throwing her arms around his neck said cheerily: "Come, Willie, Mrs. Gaylord wants to take you out for a ride! It is lovely, and Rover can have a rest!" His face crimsoned as he realized that strangers were witnessing their joyful meeting. Unperceived Mrs. Gaylord had approached, and holding out her hand said pleasantly: "Phebe was so selfish that she was going to have you all to herself but I concluded to defeat her plans. Will you be so kind as to go with us and spend the day at our rooms? We will try to make it very pleasant for you." All this was said with so much tenderness that it would have been impossible for the poor boy to refuse.
"Let me get your hat, for I see that you are all ready as usual," and Phebe forgetting her dread of the "frigid Fanny" rushed into the house, meeting that important personage on the very threshold.
"Good morning" was her cheerful salutation; "we are going to take Willie away from you for a few hours, and I have come for his hat."
"He has not been to breakfast yet," was the chilling reply. "I think you had better wait and give him time to eat."
"Perhaps it would be better," ejaculated Phebe as she passed her, hat in hand.
"In the meantime would you not like to go with me down our pleasant walk to the pond?" asked Phebe, as she came back where Mrs. Gaylord and Willie were conversing familiarly. The lady cheerfully consented and they were soon out of sight among the trees that skirted the meadow brook. When they returned, Willie was sitting by the side of Frank and his usually pale face was flushed with excitement.
"If you like we will go around by the old town road," said the driver as the rest of his company became seated. "It will be two miles farther back but it is cool and shady." "All right!" and the happy trio were rapidly borne away. Phebe had told her friend how her "dear brother" became so helpless and his sensitiveness in regard to it, and had more than once seen the tears of sympathy glisten in the fine eyes of the listener at the narration.
"His feet and limbs below the knees have not grown since he was a baby," she had said; "and of course they cannot bear the body, which is well developed. He can creep about very well, but is unwilling that any one outside of his own home should see him. When a mere child he has told me his manner of locomotion was to sit and hitch himself about, which gave him the appellation among the boys of 'hitch Evans' which so mortified his pride that he would not appear among them."
"Poor boy!" was the low response. Now, however, Mrs. Gaylord chatted pleasantly with him about the beauties of the landscape—the fading glories of the passing summer and of her own home in the sunny south, until as he said after, "I forgot that I was a mere cypher amid it all." At last they arrived at the hotel, and as Frank with his strong arms set him on the broad winding stairway he scrambled up to the top on his hands and knees, laughing as he did so because Phebe would wait for his slow movements rather than trip forward with Mrs. Gaylord, who wanted to see if Tiny had all things in readiness.