“The family have all come. Mr. Lawton seems very ill and wan, but as I have not seen him for many years, I cannot speak of his looks comparatively. I do not think that he can walk; the porters carried him from the car, and his wheel-chair is lashed behind the coach. They have brought no maids. Their luggage will be at Gilead to-night, and Bisbee has agreed to deliver it in the morning. Mr. and Mrs. Lawton, with Dr. Russell, who came on with them, it seems, are in the coach, and Miss Brooke and her brother are in the rockaway. I will house Manfred for a few moments if I may, so that I may help the doctor get his patient safely indoors.” Half turning about, Stead hesitated a moment and then added hurriedly, but with much emphasis, “For God’s sake get indoors, Miss West, and don’t stand staring down the road like that, nor mention maids, nor ask a thousand questions before they are fairly inside the door. No one knows just how much Adam Lawton remembers or understands; but his wife and daughter are neither dumb nor blind, and both look spent.” And Miss Keith, too conscience-stricken to be angry at the rating from an almost stranger, fled in and closed the door before the rockaway came over the last hill grade, and paused, as all vehicles did, on the long plateau that reached and passed the house. 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.