"I am very well, thank you," said Eudora. "So you have come home to Wellwood after all this time?"
The man made an effort and recovered himself, although his handsome face was burning.
"Yes," he remarked, with considerable ease and dignity, to which he had a right, for Harry Lawton had not made a failure of his life, even though it had not included Eudora and a fulfilled dream.
"Yes," he continued, "I had some leisure; in fact, I have this spring retired from business; and I thought I would have a look at the old place. Very little changed I am happy to find it."
"Yes, it is very little changed," assented Eudora; "at least, it seems so to me, but it is not for a life-long dweller in any place to judge of change. It is for the one who goes and returns after many years."
There was a faint hint of proud sadness in Eudora's voice as she spoke the last two words.
"It has been many years," said Lawton, gravely, "and I wonder if it has seemed so to you."
Eudora held her head proudly. "Time passes swiftly," said she, tritely.
"But sometimes it may seem long in the passing, however swift," said Lawton, "though I suppose it has not to you. You look just the same," he added, regarding her admiringly.
Eudora flushed a little. "I must be changed," she murmured.
"Not a bit. I would have known you anywhere. But I--"
"I knew you the minute you spoke."
"Did you?" he asked, eagerly. "I was afraid I had grown so stout you would not remember me at all. Queer how a man will grow stout. I am not such a big eater, either, and I have worked hard, and--well, I might have been worse off, but I must say I have seen men who seemed to me happier, though I have made the best of things. I always did despise a flunk. But you! I heard you had adopted a baby," he said, with a sudden glance at the blue and white bundle in the carriage, "and I thought you were mighty sensible. When people grow old they want young people growing around them, staffs for old age, you know, and all that sort of thing. Don't know but I should have adopted a boy myself if it hadn't been for --"
The man stopped, and his face was pink. Eudora turned her face slightly away.
"By the way," said the man, in a suddenly hushed voice, "I suppose the kid you've got there is asleep. Wouldn't do to wake him?"
"I think I had better not," replied Eudora, in a hesitating voice. She began to walk along, and Harry Lawton fell into step beside her.
"I suppose it isn't best to wake up babies; makes them cross, and they cry," he said. "Say, Eudora, is he much trouble?"
"Very little," replied Eudora, still in that strange voice.
"Doesn't keep you awake nights?"
"Oh no."
"Because if he does, I really think you should have a nurse. I don't think you ought to lose sleep taking care of him."
"I do not."
"Well, I was mighty glad when I heard you had adopted him. I suppose you made sure about his parentage, where he hailed from and what sort of people?"
"Oh yes." Eudora was very pale.
"That's right. Maybe some time you will tell me all about it. I am coming over Thursday to have a look at the youngster. I have to go to the city on business to-morrow and can't get back until Thursday. I was coming over to-night to call on you, but I have a man coming to the inn this evening--he called me up on the telephone just now--one of the men who have taken my place in the business; and as long as I have met you I will just walk along with you, and come Thursday. I suppose the baby won't be likely to wake up just yet, and when he does you'll have to get his supper and put him to bed. Is that the way the rule goes?"
Eudora nodded in a shamed, speechless sort of way.
"All right. I'll come Thursday -but say, look here, Eudora.
This is a quiet road, not a soul in sight, just like an outdoor room to ourselves. Why shouldn't I know now just as well as wait?
Say, Eudora, you know how I used to feel about you. Well, it has lasted all these years. There has never been another woman I even cared to look at. You are alone, except for that baby, and I am alone. Eudora --"
The man hesitated. His flushed face had paled. Eudora paced silently and waveringly at his side.
"Eudora," the man went on, "you know you always used to run away from me--never gave me a chance to really ask; and I thought you didn't care. But somehow I have wondered--perhaps because you never got married--if you didn't quite mean it, if you didn't quite know your own mind. You'll think I'm a conceited ass, but I'm not a bad sort, Eudora. I would be as good to you as I know how, and--we could bring him up together." He pointed to the carriage. "I have plenty of money. We could do anything we wanted to do for him, and we should not have to live alone. Say, Eudora, you may not think it's the thing for a man to own up to, but, hang it all! I'm alone, and I don't want to face the rest of my life alone. Eudora, do you think you could make up your mind to marry me, after all?"
They had reached the turn in the road. Just beyond rose the stately pile of the old Yates mansion. Eudora stood still and gave one desperate look at her lover. "I will let you know Thursday," she gasped. Then she was gone, trundling the baby- carriage with incredible speed.
"But, Eudora --"
"I must go," she called back, faintly. The man stood staring after the hurrying figure with its swishing black skirts and its flying points of rich India shawl, and he smiled happily and tenderly. That evening at the inn his caller, a young fellow just married and beaming with happiness, saw an answering beam in the older man's face. He broke off in the midst of a sentence and stared at him.
"Don't give me away until I tell you to, Ned," he said, "but I don't know but I am going to follow your example."
"My example?"
"Yes, going to get married."
The young man gasped. A look of surprise, of amusement, then of generous sympathy came over his face. He grasped Lawton's hand.
"Who is she?"
"Oh, a woman I wanted more than anything in the world when I was about your age."
"Then she isn't young?"
"She is better than young."
"Well," agreed the young man, "being young and pretty is not everything."
