“What’s the use? They’ll all be at the shindig, even that sour-faced woman, I suppose. But somehow—I feel worried about the boy. If he isn’t here bright and early in the morning I’ll go down and see what’s happened. Looks as if it were clouding up again, doesn’t it? Perhaps we’ll get snowed in!”
Big, lazy-looking snowflakes were already beginning to drift down. Scott piled more wood on the fire, and stretched out on the settle for a nap. But Nancy was restless. She found herself standing repeatedly at the window looking at the snow. She was there when at last Scott stirred and wakened. He sat up blinking, and asked, noting the twilight, “How long have I been asleep?”
Nancy laughed, relieved to hear his voice after the long stillness.
“It’s after five.”
“Good thunder!” He arose, putting an arm across her shoulders. “Poor girl! I haven’t been much company on this trip! But I didn’t sleep well last night, couldn’t get that boy out of my mind. Why, look!” Scott was staring out of the window into the growing dusk. “Here he is now! I thought you said——”
He was already at the door, flinging it wide in welcome as he went out to lift the box of milk jars from the sled. It seemed to Nancy, as the child stepped inside, that he looked subtly different—discouraged, she would have said of an older person; and when he raised his eyes she saw the unmistakable signs of recent tears.
“Oh, David!” she exclaimed, “why aren’t you at the party?”
“I didn’t go.”
The boy seemed curiously to have withdrawn into himself. His answer was like a gentle “none of your business”; but Nancy was not without a knowledge of boy nature. She thought, “He’s hurt—dreadfully. He’s afraid to talk for fear he’ll cry; but he’ll feel better to get it off his mind.” She said, drawing him toward the cheerful hearthfire, “But why not, Dave?”
He swallowed, pulling himself together with an heroic effort.