It was all so joyously familiar. The name with the foreign, snarling sound. The station-master, erect and stiff, like the old non-commissioned officer with a big German beard that he was. The flowers on the window-sills of the station-house. The faces of the station-master's wife and children against the window-panes. The smell of asphalte from the sun-baked platform.
And over there—why, that was my father, my dear, dear old father! He seemed to me to have aged a good deal. His broad back, which before had been so straight and so proudly erect, was bent and tired; and his face looked worn as if after a long illness.
His glance went down the train from carriage to carriage. I waved my hand to him and called out:
"Father!"
He turned at the sound and stared at me a moment.
At first a startled look seemed to pass over his face. A sudden wonder, as when you see something you have not expected, and then it seemed to me that he tottered backwards a step or two when he understood who it was that had called. He bent his head and pressed his hand to his eyes.
I think he was weeping.
Then I jumped out of the carriage, and the next instant I was beside him.