“Oh no, you mustn’t, Henry.  I’m getting old, you know, and any little disappointment makes me want to cry.  I thought she’d be here herself, and now you’ve got only a letter.”

“Well, now, what put that in your head?  I thought everybody knew she wasn’t coming till Saturday.”

“Saturday!  Why, come to think, I did know it.  I wonder what’s the matter with me lately?  Certainly I knew it.  Ain’t we all getting ready for her?  Well, I must be going now.  But I’ll be on hand when she comes, old man!”

Late Friday afternoon another gray veteran tramped over from his cabin a mile or so away, and said the boys wanted to have a little gaiety and a good time Saturday night, if Henry thought she wouldn’t be too tired after her journey to be kept up.

“Tired?  She tired!  Oh, hear the man!  Joe, you know she’d sit up six weeks to please any one of you!”

When Joe heard that there was a letter, he asked to have it read, and the loving messages in it for him broke the old fellow all up; but he said he was such an old wreck that that would happen to him if she only just mentioned his name.  “Lord, we miss her so!” he said.

Saturday afternoon I found I was taking out my watch pretty often.  Henry noticed it, and said, with a startled look: 

“You don’t think she ought to be here soon, do you?”

I felt caught, and a little embarrassed; but I laughed, and said it was a habit of mine when I was in a state of expenctancy.  But he didn’t seem quite satisfied; and from that time on he began to show uneasiness.  Four times he walked me up the road to a point whence we could see a long distance; and there he would stand, shading his eyes with his hand, and looking.  Several times he said: 

“I’m getting worried, I’m getting right down worried.  I know she’s not due till about nine o’clock, and yet something seems to be trying to warn me that something’s happened.  You don’t think anything has happened, do you?”

I began to get pretty thoroughly ashamed of him for his childishness; and at last, when he repeated that imploring question still another time, I lost my patience for the moment, and spoke pretty brutally to him.  It seemed to shrivel him up and cow him; and he looked so wounded and so humble after that, that I detested myself for having done the cruel and unnecessary thing.  And so I was glad when Charley, another veteran, arrived toward the edge of the evening, and nestled up to Henry to hear the letter read, and talked over the preparations for the welcome.  Charley fetched out one hearty speech after another, and did his best to drive away his friend’s bodings and apprehensions.

“Anything happened to her?  Henry, that’s pure nonsense.  There isn’t anything going to happen to her; just make your mind easy as to that.  What did the letter say?  Said she was well, didn’t it?  And said she’d be here by nine o’clock, didn’t it?  Did you ever know her to fail of her word?  Why, you know you never did.  Well, then, don’t you fret; she’ll be here, and that’s absolutely certain, and as sure as you are born.  Come, now, let’s get to decorating —­not much time left.”