I looked at Mother then.  Her face was all pinky-white, and her eyes were shining.  I guess she thought I spoke, for all of a sudden she shook her head and said: 

“No, no, I couldn’t, I couldn’t!  But you may, dear.  Run along and speak to him; but don’t stay.  Remember, Mother is waiting, and come right back.”

I knew then that it must have been just my eyes that spoke, for I did want to go down there and speak to Father.  Oh, I did want to go!  And I went then, of course.

He didn’t see me at first.  There was a long line of us, and a big fat man was doing a lot of talking to him so we couldn’t move at all, for a time.  Then it came to when I was just three people away from him.  And I was looking straight at him.

He saw me then.  And, oh, how I did love the look that came to his face; it was so surprised and glad, and said, “Oh! You!” in such a perfectly lovely way that I choked all up and wanted to cry. (The idea!—­cry when I was so glad to see him!)

I guess the two folks ahead of me didn’t think they got much attention, and the next minute he had drawn me out of the line, and we were both talking at once, and telling each other how glad we were to see each other.

But he was looking for Mother—­I know he was; for the next minute after he saw me, he looked right over my head at the woman back of me.  And all the while he was talking with me, his eyes would look at me and then leap as swift as lightning first here, and then there, all over the hall.  But he didn’t see her.  I knew he didn’t see her, by the look on his face.  And pretty quick I said I’d have to go.  And then he said: 

“Your mother—­perhaps she didn’t—­did she come?” And his face grew all red and rosy as he asked the question.

And I said yes, and she was waiting, and that was why I had to go back right away.

And he said, “Yes, yes, to be sure,” and, “good-bye.”  But he still held my hand tight, and his eyes were still roving all over the house.  And I had to tell him again that I really had to go; and I had to pull real determined at my hand, before I could break away.  And I don’t believe I could have gone even then if some other folks hadn’t come up at that minute.

I went back to Mother then.  The hall was almost empty, and she wasn’t anywhere in sight at all; but I found her just outside the door.  I knew then why Father’s face showed that he hadn’t found her.  She wasn’t there to find.  I suspect she had looked out for that.

Her face was still pinky-white, and her eyes were shining; and she wanted to know everything we had said—­everything.  So she found out, of course, that he had asked if she was there.  But she didn’t say anything herself, not anything.  She didn’t say anything, either, at the luncheon table, when Grandfather was talking with Aunt Hattie about the lecture, and telling some of the things Father had said.