“Just exactly the same.” Dora laughed as she caught Dearing's glance, and remarked to him, in an undertone: “He is such a strange child! Mother says she has never seen one so peculiarly sensitive and concerned over trifles. He often comes in from his play for nothing else than to ask me if I still love him. The slightest change in my manner or tone of voice always brings out that one question. It is the last thing at night and the first thing in the morning. If I am at all impatient with him, when I am absorbed in my work, he will come and sit on the floor at my feet, and nothing will satisfy him till I have taken him in my arms and said over and over again that I love him.” “It is his nature,” Dearing said, as he was turning to leave. “Well, remember, my boy, that my gate is not locked, and if you don't come over in my big lot, I'll come and ride you there on my back, like a two-legged horse; and I might get scared and kick up my heels and dump you over on your head.” CHAPTER III |ONE warm, fair afternoon in May, Kenneth Galt, at the earnest solicitation of General Sylvester, came home. Under big captions the Stafford papers had proudly given the particulars to the public. The great man was slightly run down from the enormous duties which had pressed upon him since the very beginning of his giant enterprise, and was to take a long and much-needed rest in the town of his birth and in the quiet old house where he had spent his boyhood. The mayor and aldermen and a brass-band had met him as he stepped from his private car at the station, and he was welcomed with spirited music and a short but ponderous speech on the part of the mayor. Then John Dilk, in a new suit of clothes and a much-worn silk top-hat, haughtily drove his master and the doting General through the streets, across the square, and on to the old Galt mansion. The crowd which had followed the carriage from the station to the square gradually dispersed, and the two friends were alone when they alighted at the gate. “Do you see those chairs and that table under the oaks on our lawn?” Sylvester asked, with the bubbling pride of a boy in a victorious ball game, as they were strolling up the wide moss-grown brick walk. Galt nodded, and smiled tentatively. “Madge is going to give us a cup of tea outdoors,” Sylvester explained. “It was her own idea. It is warm inside, and that is the shadiest, coolest spot in Stafford. The tea will refresh us. Shall we go now, or do you want to nose over the old house first?” “I see Mrs. Wilson looking out from a window,” Galt answered. “I think I'd better go in for a moment, anyway. The good old soul is in her best bib and tucker, and might feel hurt.” “Right you are!” the General said, approvingly. “You haven't risen too high, my boy, to think of those dependent on you. Run in and take possession, and I'll stir Madge up. A cup of tea of my particular blend will do you good after your dusty ride.”