Adam junior, long, lanky, and sandy of hair and skin, got out and swung his sister to the ground. Something was bundled up under one of his arms, but head and ears alone were visible. “Grandpa Lawton all over again, Scotch hair and all! and he’s brought one of those snub-nosed dogs, as I live!” ejaculated Miss Keith, from behind the curtain that screened the glass half of the door, at the same time wondering if the proper moment had arrived for hospitality. Brooke and young Adam waited for the coach to draw up before they even looked houseward, and then Dr. Russell, with serious cheerfulness, helped Mrs. Lawton, whose face Miss Keith could scarcely see for the load of pillows that she handed to her daughter. Stead and the doctor deftly bore out their burden, and Miss Keith opened the door, stepping within its shadow. So Adam Lawton came home again, surrounded by his family.
Brooke entered first, close by her father, and spying Miss Keith, there was a single moment of strained, painful silence, but only a moment, for, dropping her pillows and holding out her hand with a little smile in which the doctor and Stead alone discerned a pathetic droop, her silver voice said, “Here I am, Cousin Keith; I’ve come back to my River Kingdom, and I’ve more than kept my promise, by bringing all the others with me;” then the tension relaxed, every one spoke, though quietly, and they carried Adam Lawton into the south parlour, where the fire burned upon the wide hearth as steadily as if it had never been extinguished in all those intervening years, and set him in the old chintz-covered chair.
Miss Keith held back in stiff reserve, and Mrs. Lawton followed, at first blindly. Then, as her eyes, focussed to the firelight, took in the details of the room in one swift glance,—bed hangings, quilt, cradle, and all,—she caught her breath and turned toward Miss Keith with arms extended, and whispered, “Ah, Cousin Keith, how did you know?—how did you think of it? They say that he may come back to himself by the long way of childhood; and how could he better do that than here in his mother’s room?” And the head, with its lovely crown of silver, rested against the taller woman’s bosom, and that swift touch of sympathy bound them doubly as kin.