"And the clasp is the moon, you see!" Jack explained, eagerly. "I thought it looked like the Moonlight Sonata, Hilda, and you used to like me to play it, you know; and so I thought—you do like it? Now I am quite happy! Fate has nothing better for me than this. Except one thing!" he added, turning with boyish shyness from Hilda's warm, almost reproachful thanks,—she was hardly reconciled to his spending his hard-earned money on trinkets for her, yet she was genuinely delighted with the exquisite gift, as any right-minded girl would have been.
"There is one thing more!" said Jack. "And I think I am going to have that now. Hark! Is not that a step on the veranda? May he—may they come up here, dear Mrs. Grahame?"
Mrs. Grahame hesitated a moment, glancing at her dainty tea-gown, and then around at the perfection of the pleasant sitting-room.
"Certainly!" she said, heartily. "If you do not think Colonel Ferrers will mind,—such an old friend, and he knows I am not well to-day."
Jack and Hilda flew down-stairs as fast as they had flown up; indeed, Hilda was nearly overthrown by her cousin's impetuous rush.
"I haven't told you yet!" he cried. "Hilda, you guess, don't you? You know what the best of all is to be? He is here! He—here he is!"
He threw open the door. Colonel Ferrers's stalwart form loomed against the pale evening sky, and behind it was a tall, slender figure, stooping somewhat, with a shrinking air like a shy boy.
"Hilda, it is my father!" cried Jack, now at the top of his heaven, and "Hilda, my dear, my brother Raymond!" cried the Colonel, not a whit less pleased. Hilda found her hand taken between two slender, white hands, that trembled a little, as they drew her towards the light.
"My boy's best friend!" said Mr. Ferrers; and Hilda thought that the gentle blue eyes were even kinder than those fierce gray ones of the Colonel's, now twinkling with tears, which he brushed away with furious impatience.
"My boy's kind sister and helper! God bless you, my dear! I owe you a great debt, which only love can repay. And now take me to your mother. I have not seen her for many a long year."