ked, "that the coldest thing he can get on
this train is ginger ale."

Kemp, coming back with a golden bottle, with cracked ice in a tall
glass, with a crisp curl of lemon peel, ready for an innocuous
libation, brought his nose down from the heights to look for the foot,
found that it no longer barred the way, and marched on to hidden music.

"Leave the door open, leave it open," snapped the voice, "isn't there
an electric fan? Well, put it on, put it on----"

"He drinks nectar and complains to the gods," said the Major softly,
"why can't we, too, drink?"

They had theirs on a table which the porter set between them. The
train moved on before they had finished. "We'll be in Charlottesville
in less than an hour," the conductor announced.

"Is that where we get off, Paine?"

"One mile beyond. Are they going to meet you?"

"I'll get a station wagon."

Young Paine grinned. "There aren't any. But if Mother knows you're
coming she'll send down. And anyhow she expects me."

"After a year in France--it will be a warm welcome----"

"A wet one, but I love the rain, and the red mud, every blooming inch
of it."

"Of course you do. Just as I love the dust of the desert."

They spoke, each of them, with a sort of tense calmness. One doesn't
confess to a lump in one's throat.

The little man, Kemp, was brushing things in the aisle. He was hot but
unconquered. Having laid out the belongings of the man he served, he
took a sudden recess, and came back with a fresh collar, a wet but
faultless pompadour, and a suspicion of powder on his small nose.

"All right, sir, we'll be there in fifteen minutes, sir," they heard
him say, as he was swallowed up by the yawning door.

II

Fifteen minutes later when the train slowed up, there emerged from the
drawing-room a man some years older than Randolph Paine, and many years
younger than Major Prime. He was good-looking, well-dressed, but
apparently in a very bad temper. Kemp, in an excited, Skye-terrier
manner, had gotten the bags together, had a raincoat over his arm, had
an umbrella handy, had apparently foreseen every contingency but one.

"Great guns, Kemp, why are we getting off here?"

"The conductor said it was nearer, sir."

Randolph Paine was already hanging on the step, ready to drop the
moment the train stopped. He had given the porter an extra tip to look
after Major Prime. "He isn't used to that crutch, yet. He'd hate it
if I tried to help him.