"We had such plans," he said softly, "all of us, you know, for coming back to the old place and ending up there. Win says her kids shall stay there if she can't."
"Where is she?"
"Oh, she's 'most anywhere. Her husband's in the Navy—Asiatic Squadron—and she hangs about where he's likely to strike the country next. She was in Honolulu the last I heard. So she's not likely to do much for the place, you see."
"Where's Thea?" Miss Honey inquired.
"Wha tee?" mimicked the General, with an astounding similarity of inflection.
The young man threw his light cap at the baby's head; it landed grotesquely cocked over one eye, and the General, promptly sitting upon it to protect himself from further attacks, fell into convulsions of laughter as the young man threatened him.
"Thea's out West, on a ranch just out of Denver. She was married first, and her boys have ponies now—broncos. Of course it's fine for them out there, but she says she won't be happy till they can get East for a year or two. She wants them to see the place and grow up a little in it. She wants 'em to see the attic and poke about the barn and the stable and climb over the rocks. You see they're on the ranch all summer and in school in Denver all winter, and Thea says they don't know the look of an old stone wall with an apple tree in the corner. She says the fruit's not nearly so nice out there."
"Where is the place? Near here?"
"No, not so very. It's in the Berkshires, just out of Great Barrington. Father's practice was there, and grandfather's, too. Grandfather built it."
"That's where Lenox is, the Berkshires, isn't it?" the lady inquired with a yawn.