“To my cost,” pouted Maud. “I haven’t the least idea of what the world is like. I have to take other people’s word that it is round.”
“We found your telegram from Marseilles at two o’clock this morning when we came home from Mrs. Mountain’s dance, and, rejoiced as I was to know you were coming back to us, I took it for granted you would loiter in Paris for a week,” said Mrs. Vansittart.
“Paris is always delightful,” replied her son; “but I was tired of wandering, and was honestly homesick. And here I am safe at home, and ever so much better off than poor old Odysseus. By the way, mother, your Italian spaniel did her level best to bite me as I came upstairs, and she and I were once such friends. Dogs have altered since the days of Argus.”
“How silly of her! but she’ll love you again after a day or two. And now tell me, Jack, all you have been doing and seeing since you left Merewood last October. You are such a bad correspondent that one knows nothing about your wanderings, and if I were not well broken to your neglect I should be miserable about you.”
“See how wise my system is,” he said, laughing; “were I a good correspondent an interval of a week without a letter would scare you. I have heard of men who write regularly once a week to their people, or who keep a journal of their travels and send it home every fortnight for family perusal. But since you and Maud both know that I detest letter-writing, you expect nothing of me, and are never anxious.”
“Indeed you are wrong, Jack,” said his mother, with a sigh. “I have had many an anxious hour about you. But I’m not going to be doleful now I have you at home again, and for a long time, I hope.”
“Yes, for a long time,” echoed Jack. “I am sick of travelling.”
There was a weariness in his tone that sounded as if he meant what he said.
“And now tell me your adventures.”
The word hurt him like the sharp edge of a knife.