Through the rain, as he opened his own gate, he saw in the direction of the house next door a line of faintly glowing oblongs, swept across by wet black silhouettes of tossing foliage; and since these lighted windows at Martha’s were all downstairs, he concluded that she must have callers; for when she was alone she went up to her own room to read, and just before nine o’clock Mr. Shelby put out all the lights of the lower floor. The old gentleman was sensitive about uselessly high gas bills, in spite of the fact that he was, himself, to an almost exclusive extent, the company that produced the gas.
In the vestibule at his own door Harlan furled his umbrella, shook the spray from his waterproof overcoat, and was groping in his waistcoat pocket for the latchkey, when his mother unexpectedly opened the door for him from the inside. “I was standing at a window looking out, and saw you come up the walk,” she explained. “Your mackintosh looks soaking wet; you must be drowned! The doctor was here again awhile ago and says Lena’s doing splendidly, and the nurse just told me she and the baby are both asleep. Come into the library and dry off. Your father’s gone to bed, but he lit the fire for you before he went up. We were afraid you’d be chilled. How did you find mother?”
“About the same, I should say.” Harlan hung his dripping overcoat upon the ponderous walnut hatrack, the base of which was equipped for such emergencies with a pair of iron soup plates in a high state of ornamentation. Then he followed his mother into the library and went to sit by the fire, extending his long legs to its warmth, so that presently the drenched light shoes he wore began to emit a perceptible vapour.
“You ought to have worn your rubbers,” Mrs. Oliphant said reproachfully; and then as he only murmured “Oh, no,” in response, she said in a tone of inquiry: “I suppose you didn’t happen to see anything of Dan?”
“Not very likely! Not much to be seen between here and grandma’s just now except night and water.”
“I suppose so,” she assented. “I thought possibly you might have gone somewhere else after you left mother’s.”
“No.” But there had been something a little perturbed in her voice and he turned to look at her. “Were you at the window on Dan’s account, mother? Are you anxious about him?”