"And yet you are going to be married yourself next week?"
"That is precisely why it is such a nuisance," said Isabel.
"Would there have been enough of us without her," said her mother, "if brother George had never come back, as for so long a time we feared he would not?"
"There are never enough of us without George," replied Isabel, reddening, partly from vexation, and partly from the consciousness that the brother, of whom she was so fond and proud, was regarding her, she really did not know why, with something like surprise and disappointment.
Just then the baby stirred, woke, was taken up, admired, discussed, and caressed, and in the midst of a consultation as to what her name should be, a noise of feet and voices was heard in the hall below.
By a mutual instinct that "mothers room" should be spared the disturbance of too noisy greetings, the young people ran down-stairs. There were tender embraces on the part of the girls, more vehement and tumultuous ones from Bob, and confused cries of, "Are we not glad to see you!" and "How long you staid!" and "We thought you would never come back!" with "I was in danger of never coming back;" and "How you have grown!" and "How pretty you are!" at which Mary and Fanny laughed and blushed.
"I say, old fellow," cried Bob, "hadn't you a terrible time? were you frightened?"
"I hadn't time to be frightened," returned George, "there was too much to do."
"What could you do?"