"Well, I think you might come just this once to please us," joined in Clare, the other twin. "You are a gorgeous dancer, Phil. I'd rather have a one step with you than any man I know." Clare always beguiled where Charley bullied, a method much more successful in the long run as Charley sometimes grudgingly admitted after the fact.
Phil smiled now at pretty Clare and promised to think about it and the twins flew off across the street to visit with Tony and Ruth whom the whole Hill adored.
"Phil dear, aren't you happy?" asked Mrs. Lambert. "Have we asked too much of you expecting you to settle down at home with us?"
"Why yes, Mums. I'm all right." Phil left his post on the rail and dropped into a chair beside his mother. Perhaps he did it purposely lest she see too much. "Don't get notions in your head. I like living in Dunbury. I wouldn't live in a city for anything and I like being with Dad not to mention the rest of you."
Mrs. Lambert shifted her position also. She wanted to see her son's face; just as much as he didn't want her to see it.
"Possibly that is all so but you aren't happy for all that. You can't fool mother eyes, my dear."
Phil looked straight at her then with a little rueful smile.
"I reckon I can't," he admitted. "Very well then. I am not entirely happy but it is nobody's fault and nothing anybody can help."
"Philip, is it a girl?"
How they dread the girl in their sons' lives—these mothers! The very possibility of her in the abstract brings a shadow across the path.