"Well, unreally then?"
As he made his confession she listened eagerly. "Yes, that _was_
unreally. And you never heard anything more about her?"
"Oh, yes. When I was in Boston a few weeks ago I went to see her aunt.
She told me that Maisie had been married for the last two years to a
traveling salesman she'd been in love with for a long time, and that
she had a baby."
The thought of Maisie brought back the thought of Honey; and the
thought of Honey woke him to the fact that he had been on this spot
before.
"Why--why, Hildred! This is the very bench on which Miss Nash and the
other nurse were sitting--"
"When you were stolen?"
"When somebody was stolen." He looked round him. "And there's Miss Nash
over there!"
On the bench near the lilacs Miss Nash was seated with a book.
"We ought to go and speak to her," Hildred suggested.
Miss Nash received them with her beatific look. "I saw you leave the
house. I thought you'd come here. I followed you. I had something
to do, something I swore to God I'd do the day my little boy came
back. I'd--" She held up a novel of which the open pages were already
yellowing--"I'd finish this. _Juliet Allingham's Sin_ is the name of
it. I was just at the scene where the lover drowns when my little boy
was taken. I've never opened the book since; but I've kept it by me."
She rose, weeping. "Now I can finish it--but I'll go home."
Sitting down on the seat she had left free for them, they began to talk
of the scene of the afternoon, which as yet they had avoided.
"I hope I didn't hurt their feelings."
"They didn't mind hurting yours."
"They didn't mean to. They thought they were generous."
"Which only shows...."
"But _he's_ all right. Hildred, he's a big man."
"And you really think he's your father, Tom?"
"I know he is. Everything makes me sure of it."
"Well, then, if he's your father, she must be your mother."
"Yes, but I don't go that far. It isn't what must be that I think
about; it's what _is_."
She persisted in her logic. "And Tad and Lily must be your brother and
sister."
"They can be what they like. I don't care anything about them."
"It's only your mother that you don't...."
He got up, restlessly. It was easier to reconstruct the scene which
Honey had described to him than to let her bring what she was saying
too sharply to a point.
"It was over here that the baby carriage stood, right in the heart of
this little clump." She followed him into it. "Miss Nash and the other
nurse were over there, where we were sitting first. And right here,
just where I'm standing, the queer thing must have happened."
"Are you sorry it happened, Tom?"
"You mean, if it actually happened to me. Why, no; and yet--yes. I
can't tell. I'm sorry not to have grown up with--with my father. And
yet if I had, I should have missed--all the other things--Honey--and
perhaps you."
"Oh, you couldn't have missed me, I couldn't have missed you. We might
not have met in the way we did meet, but we'd have met."
He hardly heard her last words, because he was staring off along the
path by which they themselves had come down. His tone was puzzled,
scarcely more than a whisper.
"Hildred, look!"
"Why, it's Mr. and Mrs. Whitelaw. She's changed her dress. How young
she looks with that kind of flowered hat. I remember now. They always
come here on the tenth of May. They've been here already this morning.
Lily told me so. I know what it is. They're looking for you. Miss Nash
has told them where we are. I'm going to run."
"Don't run far," he begged of her. "I can't imagine what's up."
He stood where he was, watching their advance. It was not his place to
go forward, since he wasn't sure that he was wanted. He only thought
he must be when, as they reached the bench beneath the elm, Whitelaw
pointed him out and let his wife go on alone.
She came on in the hurried way in which she did everything, her great
eyes brimming, as they often were, with unshed tears. At the entrance
among the lilacs she held out both her hands, their diamonds upward, as
if he was to kiss them. He took the hands, but lightly, barely touching
them, keeping on his guard.
"Harry!" The staccato sentences came out as little breathless cries
torn from a heart that tried to keep them back. "Harry! You--you
needn't--love me--or be my son--or live with us--unless--unless you
like--but I want you to--to let me kiss you--just once--the way--the
way your other--mother--used to."