"And the wonder was that we didn't die of fright--"
"Now, look here," Harriet said, in the babel, "I'll give you all exactly two minutes to QUIET DOWN. Never in the course of my life--"
Richard thought her maternal indulgence delightful; he thought the young people who clung about her charming in their apologetic and laughing promises. Ward and Bruce Hopper mounted to their own region; Richard went with the girls and Harriet to the rooms that had been attacked. Pilgrim, the tireless, was already there, replacing pillows, straightening beds, untwisting curtains. The girls, with reminiscent bubbles of laughter, began to help her.
After the last good-nights, Richard and Harriet had no choice but to cross the hall again, and they stood there for a moment, laughing at the recent excitement.
"After twelve," Harriet said, with a smiling shake of her head. "Aren't they young demons! However," she added in an undertone, "it's the best thing in the world for Nina! This sort of nonsense will blow cobwebs away!"
Richard was only conscious of a desire to prolong this intimate little moment of parental consultation.
"She doesn't speak of Blondin?" he asked.
"Not at all. The birthday came and went placidly enough," Harriet answered, suddenly intent after her laughing. And as he did not speak for a second, she looked up at him, innocently. "You don't think she's hiding anything?" she asked, anxiously.
"I--no, I hardly think so," Richard answered, confusedly. Their eyes met, and he smiled vaguely. Then Harriet slowly crossed the hall to the door of the guest room where she was spending the night, and gave him an only half-audible good-night. Richard stood watching the door for a moment or two after it had closed upon the slender, dimly seen figure. Then he went to his own rooms, and began briskly enough to move about between the mirrors and dressing room, windows and bed. But two or three times he stopped short, and found himself staring vacantly into space, all movement arrested, even thought arrested for whole long minutes at a time.
Harriet, entering her room, closed the door noiselessly, and remained for a long time standing with her hands resting against it behind her, her eyes alert, her breath coming as if she had been running. There was only a night light in the bedroom; the covers were still tumbled back from her sudden flight toward the rioting youngsters in the hall. She got back into her bed, and opened her book. But for a long time she neither slept nor read; her eyes widened at the faintest sound of the summer night; her heart thumped madly when the curtains whispered at the window, or the wicker chairs gave the faintest creak. It had not been only for Richard that the midnight hour of responsibility and informality shared had had its thrill.