"Dey's 'spectin' some one, seh. As fer me, I gotta live heah all day, an' it makes me sick teh think of it."
"Heh!" retorted the agent, scornfully; "you won't git sick. You're too well paid fer that."
The porter grinned, and just then a little old gentleman with a rosy, cheery face pushed him aside and trotted down the steps.
"Mornin', Judkins!" he cried, and shook the agent's hand. "What a glorious sunrise, and what crisp, delicious air! Ah, but it's good to be in old Chazy County again!"
The agent straightened up, his face wreathed with smiles, and cast an "I told you so!" glance toward the man on the truck. But the stranger had disappeared.
CHAPTER II
THE INVASION OF MILLVILLE
Over the brow of the little hill appeared a three-seated wagon, drawn by a pair of handsome sorrels, and in a moment the equipage halted beside the sleeper.
"Oh, Thomas Hucks—you dear, dear Thomas!" cried a clear, eager voice, and out from the car rushed Miss Patricia Doyle, to throw her arms about the neck of the old, stoop-shouldered and white-haired driver, whose face was illumined by a joyous smile.
"Glad to see ye, Miss Patsy; right glad 'ndeed, child," returned the old man. But others were waiting to greet him; pretty Beth De Graf and dainty Louise Merrick—not Louise "Merrick" any longer, though, but bearing a new name she had recently acquired—and demure Mary, Patsy's little maid and an old friend of Thomas Hucks', and Uncle John with his merry laugh and cordial handshake and, finally, a tall and rather dandified young man who remained an interested spectator in the background until Mr. Merrick seized and dragged him forward.