The Reverend Donald Fraser was the first to recover normality.
“You are welcome home, Paul. I heard of you last winter in the city, but I failed to see you.” He took Paul’s hand in his, shook it warmly, patting him on the shoulder the while. “You were doing great work there, I understand.”
The Colonel and his wife joined in the greeting, but Paul fancied there was something wanting in the welcome. He missed the Colonel’s old time shout of joy at seeing him.
The Colonel then presented him formally to the young man, standing behind Peg. “Mr. Guy Laughton, the eldest son of Sir Stephen Laughton, one of our oldest Dorset families and my oldest and best friend,” the little Colonel announced in swelling words. “Guy, this is Paul Gaspard, an old family friend, indeed I might almost say a member of the family. Brought the boy up indeed.”
The young man bowed in an easy, off-hand manner, muttering his delight at the meeting. Paul took a stride toward him, offering his hand.
“I am glad to meet you, Mr. Laughton,” he said, “glad to meet an old friend of the Colonel’s.” The grip in which he expressed his delight made the young man wince.
“You will join us at dinner, Paul,” said the Colonel’s wife. “We are just sitting down.”
Something in her manner prompted Paul to decline, but the quick, eager look in Peg’s eyes decided him.
“Thank you, Aunt Augusta,” he replied. “I shall be glad to.”
The dinner somehow was going badly, despite the Colonel’s very best dinner stories and his lady’s most brilliant efforts at conversation. The young Englishman attended strictly to his eating, carrying an air of nonchalant if courteous indifference toward the efforts at conversation by the Colonel and his wife. The Reverend Donald Fraser won the gratitude of Mrs. Pelham for the gallant manner in which he came to her rescue. The minister felt the restraint and as a friend of the family was bound to do his utmost to save the situation. After the Colonel had failed in an heroic attempt to engage Laughton in a discussion of English politics, for which he cared not a farthing, English sport, in which he was deeply interested, doings at Oxford, where they had a common meeting ground, the minister took Paul in hand. He drew from him an interesting description of the life, the habits, the occupations of the Indians of the far North country. Finally he took him up on the religion of the Chippewayans.