“Sit down, dears—sit down! You make me nervous fidgeting about, and—I’m nervous enough already!” said Mrs Trevor tremulously, and her three big daughters obediently sank down on chairs and stared at each other across the room.
“I’m very sorry to say so—but I’m ill!” cried Betty tragically. “I feel awful. A kind of crawly, creepy—all—overish—sick-swimming-kind-of-feeling—I think I’m going to faint! I’m sorry to alarm you—”
But no one was in the least alarmed. Mrs Trevor only smiled feebly, while the other girls expatiated upon even more alarming symptoms.
“My heart is going like a sledge-hammer,” sighed Jill. “I feel every moment as if it might burst!—I can’t see you. The air is full of spots—”
“I’m as dizzy as dizzy,” declared Pam eloquently. “I feel exactly as I did that Wednesday Nellie and I ate chocolates all the afternoon in a hot room. If he doesn’t come soon we’d better all lie down. We could get up again when we heard the bell.”
“The bell, indeed! Miles shall not have to ring the bell when he arrives home after six years’ absence, if his mother is alive to open the door for him!” cried Mrs Trevor indignantly, and then suddenly she gave a cry, and rushed across the room. A cab laden with luggage had drawn up before the door. Miles had arrived!
Well, after all Jack was right! They did all hang round him at once. Mrs Trevor was folded in his arms, but Betty and Jill each hung on to a side, while Pam stroked the back of his head, and if they did not exactly “howl,” they were certainly by no means dry-eyed.
“My boy! My boy!” cried the mother. “Miles, oh, Miles!” sobbed the girls; and Miles mumbled incoherent answers in his big man’s voice, and quietly but surely pushed his way into the drawing-room. His eyes were shining too, but he had no intention that the passers-by should witness his emotion. He looked enormously big and broad, and tanned and important. Handsome Miles would never be, but his was a good strong face, with the firmly-set lips and clear, level gaze which speak so eloquently of a man’s character, and his mother thanked God with a full heart as she welcomed him back.
As for Miles himself, the sight of his mother brought with it a pang of sadness, for though outsiders might exclaim at her youthful appearance, six years on the wrong side of forty can never fail to leave behind them heavy traces, and to the unaccustomed eyes she looked greatly changed. He kept his arm round her as they moved forward, and his eyes grew very tender. The little mother was growing old! Her hair was quite grey, her pretty cheeks had lost their roundness—he must take more care of her than ever. She enjoyed being cared for, as all nice women did. And then Miles sat down and drank tea, and they all settled themselves to the difficult task of making conversation after a long absence. It seems sad that it should be difficult, but it is invariably the case, for when there is so much to tell, and to ask, it is difficult to know where to begin, and a certain strangeness follows hard on the first excitement. Were these smart young ladies truly and actually Betty and Jill; this young man with the Oxford drawl the once unkempt and noisy Jack? And who was this shy and awkward maypole, who had taken the place of dear, cuddlesome, wee Pam?
If it had not been for Dr Trevor, conversation would have halted sadly during the first difficult quarter of an hour, but that gentleman was fortunately free from sentimental embarrassment, and kept the ball rolling by his practical questions and remarks.