"Is this home?" cried Maude, as they stopped before the gate. "I should hardly have recognized it."
It was indeed greatly changed, for Maude Glendower had perfect taste, and if she had expended thousands upon the place, she had greatly increased its value.
"Beautiful home, beautiful home—it must not be sold," was Louis' exclamation as he gazed upon it.
"No, it must not be sold," returned Maude, while her husband smiled quietly upon them both, and said nothing.
Maude Glendower had gone to an adjoining town, but Hannah and John greeted the strangers with nosy demonstrations, the latter making frequent use of his coat skirts to wipe away his tears.
"Can you see, marm—see me as true as you live?" he said, bowing with great humility to Maude, of whom he stood a little in awe, so polished were her manners and so elegant her appearance. Maude assured him that she could, and then observing how impatient Louis appeared, she asked for Dr. Kennedy. Assuming a mysterious air, old Hannah whispered, "He's up in de ruff, at de top of de house, in dat little charmber, where he stays mostly, to get shet of de music and dancin' and raisin' ob cain generally. He's mighty broke down, but the sight of you will peart him up right smart. You'd better go up alone—he'll bar it better one at a time."
"Yes, go, sister," said Louis, who heard the last part of Hannah's remarks, and felt that he could not take his father by surprise. So, leaving her husband and brother below, Maude glided noiselessly upstairs to the low attic room, where, by an open window, gazing sorrowfully out upon the broad harvest-fields, soon to be no longer his, a seemingly old man sat. And Dr. Kennedy was old, not in years, perhaps, but in appearance. His hair had bleached as white as snow, his form was bent, his face was furrowed with many a line of care, while the tremulous motion of his head told of the palsy's blighting power. And he sat there alone, that hazy autumnal day, shrinking from the future and musing sadly of the past. From his armchair the top of a willow tree was just discernible, and as he thought of the two graves beneath that tree he moaned, "Oh, Katy, Matty, darlings. You would pity me, I know, could you see me now so lonesome. My only boy is over the sea—my only daughter is selfish and cold, and all the day I'm listening in vain for someone to call me father."
"Father!" The name dropped involuntarily from the lips of Maude, standing without the door.
But he did not hear it, and she could not say it again; for he was not her father; but her heart was moved with sympathy, and going to him laid her hands on his head and looked into his face.
"Maude—Matty's Maude—my Maude!" And the poor head shook with a palsied tremor, as he wound his arms around her and asked her when she came.