"Great Scott, they are!" said Allan, "and the buns and stuff you held Mrs. Hewitt up for are in the bottom of the car, locked up in the garage—where you wanted to be."
"Which is providential," said the children's mother thankfully. "It's an alibi. They can't get any till tomorrow, no matter how much we want to give them any."
So they tiptoed up the stairs. Joy turned off into her own room, but she heard enough to know that no soft-footedness had availed. She heard Philip's clear, deliberate little voice demanding, "How much party did you bring me home, Mother?" and the hopeful patter of Angela's feet.
She shut her door tight before she knew how it turned out. She had a good deal to do, because she was going to have to take a train that got her away from Wallraven before John found time from his rounds to come back next morning. Gail might have told Mrs. Hewitt—any number of people—by this time. She did not want to see any of them again. And she loved them all very much.
She took off her frock with slow, careful fingers, and put on a kimono to pack in. Her trunk was against the wall. As she worked steadily over the tissue-paper and hangers and things to be folded, she thought she was beyond feeling anything at all, till she felt something wet on her face, and found that she was crying silently, without having known it in the least.
The green and silver frock—the white top-coat—that had burrs on it, where she had gotten out by the roadside to pick some goldenrod, and John had not gotten them all quite off—the little blue dress with the fichu that John had said made her look as if she belonged in a house instead of a story-book—the gray silk she had loved so, and worn so hard it was middle-age-looking already—the brown wool jersey suit she must travel in——
She laid this last across a chair, and tried to go on packing. That was the frock she had worn when John came to her in the woods, and was so kind, and so good, and told her he would let her have her happy month.... Well, she'd had it. And it was worth it—it was worth anything!
But she put her head down on the side of the trunk and sobbed and sobbed.
Presently she went on with her packing, and finished it by a little after four-thirty. The suitcase had to be filled. When it was done she took a bath and dressed, and lay down on the bed as she was. There was a train at nine-ten, that got her back home late in the afternoon, and she was taking no chances.
She slept a little, always with the nine-ten train on her mind, and finally rose and locked her trunk at half-past seven. She put the key and her ticket and what money she had in her hand-bag, fastened on her cap, took her suitcase, and stole downstairs. Nobody was astir yet but Lily-Anna, and Viola, who was giving the early-waking Angela her breakfast in an informal way in the corner of the kitchen.