all the time—­dear, sweet, darling little mother!  Oh, Harold, you must come home and share my happiness.  Truly Harold, you ought to see how stiffly Mrs. Tracy carries herself toward me—­stiffer, if possible, than she did when I came up the front steps in my muddy shoes and she bade me go round to the back door.  Poor Mrs. Tracy!’

During the next few days Jerrie stayed with Maude, who constantly grew weaker and weaker, and who asked about every hour if anything had been heard from her uncle since his message that he was coming.

‘I shall never see Harold,’ she said to Jerrie; but I must live till uncle Arthur comes, and you are put in your right place.’

And at last, one lovely September morning, a telegram was brought to Frank from Charles, which said the travellers would be home that afternoon, and that the carriage must be sent to meet them.

CHAPTER XLIX.

TELLING ARTHUR.

Who should do the telling was the question which for some time was discussed by Frank and Judge St. Claire and Jerrie.  Naturally the task fell upon the latter, who for three or four days prior to Arthur’s arrival remained altogether at the Park House, watching by Maude, and going over and over again in her mind what she should say and how she should commence.

At last the announcement came that Arthur was in Albany, and then it seemed to Jerrie that she had suddenly turned into stone, for every thought and feeling had left her, and she had no plan or action or speech as she moved mechanically about Arthur’s rooms, making them bright with flowers, especially the Gretchen room, which seemed a bower of beauty when her skilful hands had finished it.  Once, as she was passing through the hall with her arms full of flowers she met Mrs. Tracy, whose face wore a most forbidding expression as she said: 

’I hope you will leave a few flowers for Maude.  You know she likes them so much.’

Jerrie made no reply, but by the pang of resentment which shot through her heart at the smallness of the woman, she knew she was not past all feeling, and that there was still something human in the stone, as she had styled herself.

Slowly the day wore on, every minute seeming an hour, and every hour a day, until at last Jerrie heard the carriage driving down the avenue, and not long after the whistle of the engine in the distance.  Then, bending over Maude and kissing her fondly, she said: 

‘Pray for me, darling, I am going to meet my father.’

Arthur had been very quiet during the first part of the journey from San Francisco, and it was with difficulty that Charles could get a word from him.

‘Let me alone,’ he said once, when spoken to.  ’I am with Gretchen.  She is on the train with me, and I’m trying to make out what it is she is telling me.’