The train went at seven-thirty. The house must be lighted and the gas turned down, and the new maid impressed with the fact that they would be back at a little after nine, though it might really be nearer ten. After Lois was ready, she went in once more to look at Justin as he slept—his head thrown forward a little on the pillow, his right hand clasped, and his knees bent as one supinely running in a dream race with fate. Lois stooped over and laid her cheek to his hair, to his hand, as one who sought for the swift, reviving warmth of the spirit.
Then the two women walked down the street toward the station, Lois absorbed in her own thoughts, and Dosia distracted, confused, half assenting and half dissenting to the expedition.
“Are you sure Mr. Larue will be at Collingswood?” she asked anxiously.
“Justin saw him Saturday. He said he was going out there then for the summer.”
So far it would be all right, then. They had passed the Snows’ house, and Dosia looked eagerly for some sign of life there; she hesitated, and then went on. As they got beyond it, at the corner turning, she looked back, and saw Miss Bertha had come out on the piazza.
“I’ll catch up to you in a moment,” she said to Lois, and ran back quickly.
“Miss Bertha!”
“Why, Dosia, my dear, I didn’t see you; don’t speak loud!” Miss Bertha’s face, her whispering lips, her hands, were trembling with excitement. “We’ve been under quite a strain, but it’s all over now—I’m sure I can tell you. Dear mother has gone up-stairs with a sick-headache! Mr. Sutton has just proposed to Ada—in the sitting-room. We left them the parlor, but they preferred the sitting-room. Mother’s white shawl is in there, and I haven’t been able to get it.”
“Oh!” said Dosia blankly, trying to take in the importance of the fact. “Is Mr. Girard in? No? Will he be in later?”
“No, not until to-morrow night,” said Miss Bertha as blankly, but Dosia had already gone on. She did not know whether she were relieved or sorry that Girard was not there. She did not know what she had meant to say to him, but it had seemed as if she must see him. She caught up to Lois and the baby in a few steps, and drew back into the station as Billy passed it. She had felt anxiously as if some one ought to know where they were going, but not Billy—Billy, who was always now either too melancholy or too joyous, as she rebuffed or relented.