Under the Country SkyRichmond, Grace S. (Grace Smith)
General
Under the Country Sky
Richmond, Grace S. (Grace Smith)
Country life -- Fiction; Love stories; Young women -- Fiction
"I have a chair here for the gentleman," the man said, and he indicated
one of the station chairs attended by a red-capped porter.
Mr. Warne, being wheeled rapidly through the great station, looked
about him with the eager eyes of a boy. It was twenty years--twenty long
and quiet years, since he had been in New York. What had not happened
since then? In spite of the myriad descriptions he had read and pictures
he had studied, the effect upon him of the real city, as, having been
transferred from the chair to a small but luxurious closed car, he was
conveyed along the thronged, astonishingly lighted streets, was
overwhelming. Suddenly he closed his eyes and laid his head back against
the cushioned leather.
Georgiana bent anxiously toward him. "Are you frightfully tired, Father
dear? Are you--faint?"
His eyes opened and his lips smiled reassuringly. "A little tired, my
dear, and very much dazed, but not upset in any way. I shall be glad to
sleep--and glad to wake in this wondrous city."
CHAPTER XXII
TOASTS
They drove downtown for many blocks, turning at last into an old and
still notable square which is one of the great town's almost untouched
residence districts, in the very heart of its teeming commercial life.
Here, all at once, the noise of traffic was quieted. Only as a distant
and not too disturbing murmur came the sounds of the warfare which raged
so near. At one of the dingy but still stately old houses the car drew
up, the chauffeur alighted and opened the door. He escorted the
travelers up the steps and rang the bell.
The door was opened by a lad in plain livery, and he was reinforced
immediately by a middle-aged housekeeper who came forward and took the
guests in charge. She had a rosy face and iron-gray hair and her accent
was distinctly Scotch.
"I am Mrs. MacFayden, Doctor Craig's hoose-keeper," she said. "Doctor
Craig is mair than sorry not to be here to greet ye baith. He tell't me
to say ye should mak' yersels quite at hame, and should hae yer dinners
wi'oot waitin' for him. If Maister Warne should be tae weary tae sit up
longer, he should gang awa' tae his bed. I know Doctor Craig will mak'
all the haste posseeble, but 'tis seldom he can carry oot his ain plans,
for the press o' sick folks aifter him day an' nicht."
"Doctor Craig is very kind," said Mr. Warne. "If it will not seem
discourteous I think I shall lie down upon my bed, for I am not
accustomed to travel and am a little tired."
"That wull be the best thing posseeble for ye," said the kindly
housekeeper, leading the way upstairs. "Tammas, ye'll bring the luggage.
I should advise, Maister Warne, havin' a small tray in your room an'
then attemptin' no mair than juist tae see Doctor Craig, when he cooms
tae say gude nicht."
She led her guests into a large, square, pleasant room, furnished with
old mahogany. A cheery fire was burning in a fireplace. She opened a
second door, and showed a connecting room, of lesser size but very
attractive.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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