“That’s true, I am,” said Cis. “But you’ve grown up since I saw you. You’re not bigger; I don’t mean that, but you’re grown up!”
“Right you are!” declared Tom with a slight swagger. “But I’m hardly any younger than you; don’t try to talk like a grandmother! Girls get old quicker. You’ve what is it? Side?”
“Goodness, is it?” laughed Cis. “Aren’t we going somewhere, Tom? We aren’t going to stay here all night, are we? It was good of Nan to send you to meet me.”
“Good! Of Nan! To send me!” Tom cried in a series of small explosions. “Gosh! As though a man had no mind of his own! As though Nan sent me, like a kid! I tell you, Cis, I’ve hardly been able to sleep since I heard you were coming, for fear I’d miss meeting your train! I tell you, Cis, it’s been hard sledding with you gone, and if I’ve grown old it’s from missing you, if you want to know!”
“Well, Tom! That’s a dear boy to remember Cis so hard,” said Cis, falling back into her old boyish way of speaking, association with the place and with the lad to whom she had returned, calling it out. But she found this earnestness of Tom’s wearisome, and devoutly wished that he had not been so loyal to her memory.
“Come over to the taxi stand,” said Tom. “Here, give over that suitcase. Checks?”
“One check, one small trunk,” said Cis yielding up her case and check to this protector.
Tom handed her check to an expressman, and gave him the address of Nan’s house. Then he resumed his way toward the taxi stand, holding Cis by one elbow.
As he put her into the cab, and entered it himself he said:
“Say, Nan has a son; three days old, he is. She wouldn’t let them telegraph you for fear you’d hold off coming a little. But she told me to tell you that she was so crazy to see you that it would do her more good to have you walk in than even to see the baby! And heaven knows, she’s wild over him, though, honest; he’s not such a much! I never saw one so young, and I think age improves ’em more’n it does wine.”