They both laughed, the man in a hearty natural way, the woman with the low silvery trained laugh of the stage. She wasn't making it, though. I felt that she was really enjoying herself.
They laughed again when their boy took a flying leap over a rail fence, and she said, in her pathetic voice, "Douglas, I should like to walk the rest of the way."
He took her off my back, and when I saw that he knew where the gate was, I too went over the fence, and feeling that they were staring with great interest at me, I dashed after my boy.
He was absolutely yelling at the back door, "Bingi! my mother and father are here," then he raced round the veranda shouting in every window, "My parents are here—Uncle Jim, Aunt Bretta, take notice, also Big Chief, Cassowary, Champ, Sojer, Dovey and little Big Wig. Oh! kids, one and all—I'm just like other boys. I've got a mother exactly like yours."
Joyful yells and cries answered him, and Mrs. Devering herself forgetting her anti-noise laws, put her head out of an upper window and gave a happy hail to the two dear persons coming down the hill.
"Squirrie Sore-Feet!" screamed Dallas to the chipmunk who came out of a hole in a tree, "no one will ever catch me and make me perform in public like poor you—my father wouldn't let them. Birds in the trees, sing with me—my mother is here, is here, is here. Barnyard and stable folk, I'll come up after dinner and give you the good word."
By this time, a gleeful procession of grown-ups and children was hurrying up the hill, Barklo shrieking at their heels, Constancy following him and Baywell limping behind them.
Mr. and Mrs. Devering gave the two parents the warmest greetings, then Mr. Devering took his pale-faced sister on his arm, walked down to the veranda with her and put her in a big rocking-chair.
There she held court, all the children gathering round her, and Bingi and O-Mayo-San bowing respectfully in the distance.