The view gave upon the avenue of
cottonwoods and the circular carriage approach. A touring-car, with its
powerful head-lights paling the white radiance of the moon, was drawn up
at the steps, and he had a glimpse of a big man, swathed from head to
heel in a dust-coat, descending from the tonneau.
"I suppose that will be 'Mahsteh Majah,'" he mused sleepily. "That's
why the little lady was sitting up so late--she was waiting for him."
Then to the thronging queries threatening to return and keep him awake:
"Scat!--go away! call it a pipe-dream and let me go to sleep!"
V
AT WARTRACE HALL
In his most imaginative moments, Evan Blount had never prefigured a
home-coming to coincide in any detail of it with the reality.
When he opened his eyes on the morning following the night of singular
adventures, the sun was shining brightly in at the bed's-head window, a
cheerful fire was blazing on the hearth, and his father, a little
heavier, a little grayer, but with the same ruggedly strong face and
kindly eyes, was standing at his bedside.
"Father!"--and "Evan, boy!" were the simple words of greeting; but the
mighty hand-grip which went with them was for the younger man a
confirmation of the filial hope and a heart-warming promise for the
future. Following instantly, there came a rush of mingled emotions: of
astoundment that he had recognized no familiar landmark in the midnight
faring through the hills or on the approach to the home of his
childhood; of something akin to keen regret that the old had given place
so thoroughly and completely to the new; of a feeling bordering on
chagrin that he had been surprised into accepting the hospitable
advances of a woman whom he had been intending to avoid, and for whom he
had hitherto cherished--and meant to cherish--a settled aversion.
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