The Potter and the Clay: A Romance of Today
Page 26
*V.*
Weeks later, when Stewart was able, he went around to see Cary.
"It’s a dreadful pull—up those stairs," said Cary, rolling forward achair and looking anxiously at Stewart as he stood wan and breathless,but smiling, in the doorway.
"It never used to be," he panted, sitting down.
His eyes wandered about the room.
"Jove, but it’s good to get back here! And you haven’t changed things abit—even the Psyche in her old place! And the little tea kettle—Jove!"
He leaned back restfully.
She laughed and watched him in silence.
"I’ll miss it all like the dickens!"
She looked up quickly from the flowers she was just beginning toarrange.
"You are not going away, are you?" she asked.
He nodded and sighed.
"Home—to Scotland. The lease on the place has run out, and they thinkcountry air will brace me up a bit—so we’re going. It’ll seem queer toget back there after all these years."
"You—you’re going to give up the Grosvenor Square house?"
"Yes. I suppose, though, we’ll come back every year for the season andtake a suite at the Langham or the Buckingham Gate. Father has an ideathat he’ll put me through a course of politics up there, when we’realone, and there’s nothing going on." Stewart smiled mirthlessly.
"You are thinking of going into politics, when you get strong?" askedCary for something to say. A sudden unutterable homesickness had sweptover her.
"I’m not sure—it isn’t unlikely though. I suppose that’s as good a wayto serve the country as half a man can—perhaps a little better—to tryand help keep one detail of the government’s work clean! Father has sethis heart on the Diplomatic service for me."
"I should think you’d like that," said Cary. Talking to-day for somereason was an effort.
"I’m not sure. What are you and the Captain going to do withyourselves?"
Cary leaned against the back of a chair, tearing a stray rose leaf topieces. She looked down at it as she spoke.
"Papa wants another tramp through the Alps. I’m not in the mood fortramping, but he’s been so good I can’t say a word. When we’ve climbedMont Blanc again and come down, I think I’ll get Daddy to take me home.I think I’m a little mite homesick."
She turned quickly and buried her face in the roses. An odd lightsprang to Stewart’s eyes.
"Haven’t you been happy in England?" he asked.
Cary lifted her head, her face dyed with the deep red of the roses.
"Happy! There’s no place like England—except America," she said. "Ilove every stone in England—in the United Kingdom! Months ago Daddy andI spent a July in Hertfordshire. I can see it all now; the gloriousgreen of everything; the undulating country and the woods and thescattered old cottages, with the village in the distance and the churchspire showing, and the little river and the cornfields and the poppies!"She breathed quicker. "There is only one thing sweeter I know—the oldfort at home and the long beach and the sea."
She stopped, and the red of the roses faded. She went on slowly.
"Yes, I guess I’m a little bit homesick, for the beach and the sea."
"Do you remember when we were crossing I asked you to let me take you tomy home in Scotland when the homesickness came?" asked Stewart. "Youmight come to us when the Captain is re-climbing Mont Blanc."
He paused, waiting for an answer, but Cary was silent.
"Wouldn’t you come?"
She threw the last bit of the torn leaf away and came toward him andstopped, her hands on the back of a chair, a smile creeping into hereyes.
"I might—if I was asked," she said demurely.
He laughed like a boy.
"Mother’ll see to that."
"She’ll have to," said Cary, tossing her head.
"But you’d still be homesick?"
She wrinkled up her forehead.
"Goodness, even Scotland isn’t America," she answered. "Why, I supposeI would—some!"
Stewart closed the carriage door decidedly. Then he leaned back andstared into the mirror opposite, addressing the reflection there. Theodd light had come back to his eyes.
"It’s what I’ve been waiting for," he said, speaking aloud and slowly;"it’s what I’ve been waiting for all these years. She’s homesick, andshe shall come home—to me."