He folded the Chicago Advertiser and packed it carefully in his portmanteau. "I'm keeping this to show my people," he explained. "It's the sort of thing that used to make my young sister grin."
"You have—er—a young sister?"
"I had two—fifteen years ago."
The clergyman again looked sorry he had spoken.
"All right—this time. They're not dead. Only one of them isn't quite so young as she used to be. The best of it is, it's a surprise visit I'm paying them. They none of them know I'm coming. I simply said I might be turning up one of these days—before very long."
"They won't be sorry to have you back again, I imagine."
"Sorry?"
He smiled sweetly and was silent for some minutes, evidently picturing the joy, the ecstasy, of that return. Then, feeling no doubt that the ice was broken, he launched out into continuous narrative.
"Going out's all very well," he said, "but it isn't a patch on coming home. Not but what you can overdo the thing. I knew a man who was always coming home—seemed as if he couldn't stop away. I don't know that his people were particularly glad to see him."
"How was that?"