“Ada, my love, Esther, my dear, you are welcome.  I rejoice to see you!  Rick, if I had a hand to spare at present, I would give it you!”

The gentleman who said these words in a clear, bright, hospitable voice had one of his arms round Ada’s waist and the other round mine, and kissed us both in a fatherly way, and bore us across the hall into a ruddy little room, all in a glow with a blazing fire.  Here he kissed us again, and opening his arms, made us sit down side by side on a sofa ready drawn out near the hearth.  I felt that if we had been at all demonstrative, he would have run away in a moment.

“Now, Rick!” said he.  “I have a hand at liberty.  A word in earnest is as good as a speech.  I am heartily glad to see you.  You are at home.  Warm yourself!”

Richard shook him by both hands with an intuitive mixture of respect and frankness, and only saying (though with an earnestness that rather alarmed me, I was so afraid of Mr. Jarndyce’s suddenly disappearing), “You are very kind, sir!  We are very much obliged to you!” laid aside his hat and coat and came up to the fire.

“And how did you like the ride?  And how did you like Mrs. Jellyby, my dear?” said Mr. Jarndyce to Ada.

While Ada was speaking to him in reply, I glanced (I need not say with how much interest) at his face.  It was a handsome, lively, quick face, full of change and motion; and his hair was a silvered iron-grey.  I took him to be nearer sixty than fifty, but he was upright, hearty, and robust.  From the moment of his first speaking to us his voice had connected itself with an association in my mind that I could not define; but now, all at once, a something sudden in his manner and a pleasant expression in his eyes recalled the gentleman in the stagecoach six years ago on the memorable day of my journey to Reading.  I was certain it was he.  I never was so frightened in my life as when I made the discovery, for he caught my glance, and appearing to read my thoughts, gave such a look at the door that I thought we had lost him.

However, I am happy to say he remained where he was, and asked me what I thought of Mrs. Jellyby.

“She exerts herself very much for Africa, sir,” I said.

“Nobly!” returned Mr. Jarndyce.  “But you answer like Ada.”  Whom I had not heard.  “You all think something else, I see.”

“We rather thought,” said I, glancing at Richard and Ada, who entreated me with their eyes to speak, “that perhaps she was a little unmindful of her home.”

“Floored!” cried Mr. Jarndyce.

I was rather alarmed again.

“Well!  I want to know your real thoughts, my dear.  I may have sent you there on purpose.”

“We thought that, perhaps,” said I, hesitating, “it is right to begin with the obligations of home, sir; and that, perhaps, while those are overlooked and neglected, no other duties can possibly be substituted for them.”