“Well, well; enough,” said I; “don’t in future venture to do it even between ourselves, if you care to retain my friendship. Now. Robin,” I added, as the train slowed, “of course you’ll not let a hint of our reason for going north pass your lips to poor granny or any one; and give her the old message, that I’ll be along to see her soon.”
It was pleasant to return to such a hearty reception as I met with from the doctor’s family. Although my absence had been but for a few days, the children came crowding and clinging round me, declaring that it seemed like weeks since I left them. The doctor himself was, as usual, exuberant, and his wife extremely kind. Miss Blythe, I found, had not yet returned, and was not expected for some time.
But the reception accorded me by the doctor and his family was as nothing to the wild welcome lavished upon me by Dumps. That loving creature came more nearly to the bursting-point than I had ever seen him before. His spirit was obviously much too large for his body. He was romping with the McTougall baby when I entered. The instant he heard my voice in the hall he uttered a squeal—almost a yell—of delight, and came down the two flights of stairs in a wriggling heap, his legs taking comparatively little part in the movement. His paws, when first applied to the wax-cloth of the nursery floor, slipped as if on ice, without communicating motion. On the stairs, his ears, tail, head, hair, heart, and tongue conspired to convulse him. Only when he had fairly reached me did the hind-legs do their duty, as he bounced and wriggled high into air. Powers of description are futile; vision alone is of any avail in such a case. Are dogs mortal? Is such overflowing wealth of affection extinguished at death? Pshaw! thought I, the man who thinks so shows that he is utterly void of the merest rudiments of common sense!
I did not mention the object of my visit to York to the doctor or his wife. Indeed, that natural shyness and reticence which I have found it impossible to shake off—except when writing to you, good reader—would in any case have prevented my communicating much of my private affairs to them, but particularly in a case like this, which seemed to be assuming the aspect of a wildly romantic hunt after a lost young girl, more like the plot of a sensational novel than an occurrence in every-day life.
It may be remarked here that the doctor had indeed understood from Mrs Willis that she had somehow lost a granddaughter; but being rather fussy in his desires and efforts to comfort people in distress, he had failed to rouse the sympathy which would have drawn out details from the old woman. I therefore merely gave him to understand that the business which had called me to the north of England had been unsuccessful, and then changed the subject.
Meanwhile Dumps returned to the nursery to resume the game of romps which I had interrupted.
After a general “scrimmage,” in which the five chips of the elder McTougall had joined, without regard to any concerted plan, Dolly suddenly shouted “’Top!”
“What are we to stop for?” demanded Harry, whose powers of self-restraint were not strong.
“Want a ’est!” said Dolly, sitting down on a stool with a resolute plump.
“Rest quick, then, and let’s go on again,” said Harry, throwing himself into a small chair, while Job and Jenny sprawled on an ottoman in the window.