He nodded. “He came down to look after the accident, and his train stopped a minute at the office. He wants me—I think he needs me—But it ’s for you to say, mother—you and father.”
The breath of a sigh came to her lips and changed to a smile. “Ah, if you can get your father to go—”
He smiled back, his eyes searching her face for the slightest shadow that should cross it. “He ’ll go,” he said decisively. “And he ’ll like it—after we get there. But will you like it, mother! That ’s what I ’m afraid of—You ’ll miss your friends—and little things—”
“I shall have you,” she returned quickly, “and your father—and President Tetlow.”
He smiled a little at the picture. But his face had suddenly cleared. “I believe you would like him,” he said. “I never thought before how much alike you are—you two—in some ways!”
She laughed out. “He’s a terrible hard man to get on with!”
He bent and kissed her cheek lightly. “For other people, perhaps—not for you—or me.” She had lifted the clovers and was looking at them. “How beautiful they are!” she said softly. They dropped again to her side. “I want to go.” She was looking at him with clear eyes. “And I want you to go—I didn’t see how it was when we talked it over last winter—how much it would mean to you. I dreaded the change and your father is so hard to move—and I thought, too, that it would be too much for you—having me to look after and all the responsibility besides. I did n’t see then—but I’ve been thinking about it months now, lying here. You really liked the work there and that made it easy—” She was looking at him inquiringly.
He nodded slowly. “I liked it—I don’t think I ever did any work I liked so well. It was almost as if I thought things out myself. I can’t explain how it felt—but somehow I used to forget, almost, that I was n’t planning things—It seemed so natural to do them—the things he wanted done.”
“I know.” She sighed softly. “How he must miss you!”
He seemed not to have heard her. He was following his thought, clearing it to his slow mind. “You ’re right in the midst of things down there. It’s like being fireman on one of these big engines, I guess—every shovelful you put in, you can see her fly just as if you were doing it yourself. Here it ’s different, somehow. I do first one thing and then another, but nothing seems to count much.”