ing-room, Fulton's hand dropped
from his wife's waist. She was very rosy and lovely. They looked as
if they had loitered on their way back from the nursery.

"Mrs. Fulton," I said, "I don't like your coffee-machine because I
think it's going to explode, and we don't know how to get the coffee
out. And I don't like your friend. She _has_ exploded and scalded me
cruelly."

"Oh," said Lucy, with the look of a knowing child, "I know, you've been
playing truths, and Evelyn's got a New England conscience."

"If she wasn't so good-looking," I said, "I don't believe people would
have her around, after a few experiences."

"You must try not to let her get on your nerves," said Fulton, "for I'm
counting on you to keep an eye on this household while I'm away, and to
see that those who inhabit it behave themselves."

"I don't want any more talk about going away," said Mrs. Fulton; "the
fact is bad enough. I'm not a bit ashamed to have people know that
I'll be miserable and cross all the time you are gone."

But she wasn't.

I saw her the next day just after his train had pulled out. She had
taken Jock and Hurry to see him off. And all three, I was told by an
eye-witness, had wept openly and without shame. My informant, Mrs.
Deering, said that she had been reminded of Louis XVI leaving his
family for the scaffold. But when I saw them five minutes later (you
could still hear the far-off coughing of the northbound train) only
Hurry looked grave, while Jock and his mother were illustrating to
perfection the old adage, "Out of sight out of mind."

They did not look like a mother and her children, but like a big sister
with her very littlest brother and sister. Hurry, sitting in the
middle, was being allowed to hold the reins and the whip. She was in
her usual hurry, and you could see at a glance that over any actual use
of the whip friction was constantly arising. Under the runabout could
be seen the thin dangling legs of Cornelius Twombly. I waved and
shouted. Mrs. Fulton and Jock waved and shouted back, and Hurry seized
the opportunity to strike cunningly with the whip. The horse lurched
sharply forward, the three handsome bare heads jerked sharply back, and
upon two wheels, in dust and laughter, they rounded the nearest corner
and vanished.

I was going nowhere in particular, and so I turned my pony and trotted
after them. If they came to grief, I thought, I owed it to Fulton to
be on hand to pick up the pi