She still had hold of the hand which he left limply in her clasp, and he looked at her smiling face and said “Thank you,” and smiled too. The kindliness of her welcome warmed his heart, though it was not the welcome he wanted from the house. It was like the welcome from the cottages in the row, which was pleasant and comforting but had nothing to do with home. Agnes was mistress of the place, but she was a stranger, too, and no stranger could give you the real feeling of home. She had never been in the house when he went in his dream, and now that she spoke in the dream it was bound to seem strange. But she was pleasant to look at, and homely, and very kind, and she would grow to be part of the real things after a while. So when she continued to smile he smiled again, and Thomas smiled joyfully over by the stair. Perhaps there was just a touch of self-satisfaction in the smile, because he was thinking of Marget’s welcome home. Anyhow, they had done the old man better than that, even if Agnes had been off the spot! He forgot, as he watched, that he had been afraid, that things had seemed to be going utterly wrong. He only remembered that they were perfect now—the house, the weather, and the kindly wife. Certainly, it would be queer if his father wasn’t content ... but then he was positive he would be content.... Agnes was sure of it, at least, sure as triumphant angels gathering tired souls into heaven. Now she was laughing and repeating her first speech—it was curious how they repeated themselves to-night. Then she flew to the hearth and set the kettle back to boil, afterwards swinging round to put the visitor into his chair. “Set you down, Father, and I’ll make the tea. You’ll be wanting your tea, I reckon, after yon drive. Now, then, Thomas, shove it nearer the fire, and don’t stand poping like a pig at a punch! There you be, Father ... champion ... now you’ll do. Shall I put fiddle down for you, by the way?” He looked at her as she stood in front of him, holding out her hand, and a look of anxious terror crossed his face. It was true that she looked like the lasses who had loved the fiddle in the past, but that was before he had learned to be afraid. Still, this was home, and to refuse was to be false to the dream from the very first, because home was a place where every man’s foolishness was safe. “You’ll mind what you’re at?” he pleaded, searching her with his eyes, and she nodded her head wisely, and for the first time did not smile. Taking it gently, she set it on a table near, and there was no tremor of nervousness from the strings. She nodded again as she turned away, as though the fiddle was a secret that they shared.... “I’m feared to let it out o’ my sight,” Kit explained in an apologetic tone. “Marget was that set on shoving it in the fire.”