A HAPPY REUNION
The tall, fine-looking man who stood on the front porch lifted his hat as
Mrs. Gray opened the door.
“I’m Mr. Morrison,” he said, and then he hastened to inquire: “How is my
little girl today?”
The housekeeper’s face brightened. “Oh, I’m so glad that you have come,”
she said. “Geraldine was asking for you but a moment ago. She is much
better, but I am not sure that she is strong enough to see you unless I
first tell her that you are here. Sudden joy may be as great a shock as
sudden sorrow.”
But, as they ascended the stairs and went quietly down the corridor, they
heard the girl calling, “Daddy! Oh, I know it’s you, Daddy. I’ve been
expecting you all day long.”
When the tender greeting was over, with shining eyes the girl looked at
him as she said, “I’m going to get well right away now, I know. I’ve been
so lonesome for you, Dad.” Turning toward the little old lady, she added
lovingly: “Mrs. Gray is my make-believe grandmother, and you can’t guess
how good she has been to me.” Then suddenly thinking of something, she
smilingly declared: “Why, that makes Mrs. Gray your make-believe mother,
doesn’t it, Dad?”
The man, because of his great anxiety about his daughter, had scarcely
noticed the old lady. He now turned and looked at her, intending to thank
her for her kindness to his little girl. To his surprise tears were
rolling unheeded down the wrinkled cheeks, although, in the sweet face,
there was an expression of radiant joy. Then Mrs. Gray held out her arms
to the amazed man and said in a voice that trembled with emotion,
“Alfred, my boy, don’t you know me?”
A few moments later when the Colonel entered the room he smiled around at
the happy group.
“Well, Mrs. Gray,” he said after he had exchanged greetings with the
newcomer, “we don’t have to keep our secret any longer, do we?”
“Oh, Colonel Wainright,” Geraldine exclaimed, “have you known all the
time that Mrs. Gray was my real grandmother?”
“Yes, lassie, but she did not want me to tell you. She wished first of
all to win your love.”
A door banged below and Alfred leaped up the stairs two steps at a time,
Susan having told him that his father had arrived.
He, too, was amazed to learn that Mrs. Gray was their grandmother. “I’m
bully glad,” the lad exclaimed, as he kissed the beaming old lady. Then
he added: “Of course I knew that Dad ran away from home when he was
sixteen and that he had never since seen his parents, but you thought
they were dead, didn’t you, Dad?” His father nodded.
“I’ve been alone for ten years,” Mrs. Gray told them, “and during that
time I’ve been hunting for my boy.”
“All’s well that ends well!” Alfred said, and his father added: “Just as
soon as Geraldine is able to travel, we must return to our home in
Dorchester.”
“Oh, Dad!” the girl protested, “I do wish we might stay in the country
forever.”
* * * * * * * *
The next day, at Mrs. Gray’s suggestion, her son took her for a drive in
the light buggy. Although the Colonel had two automobiles, the little old
lady preferred the old-fashioned way of traveling. They drove along
Willowbend Road, where the last bits of snow were rapidly disappearing
and where reddish green buds were to be seen on the drooping trees that
gave the country road its name.
Mrs. Gray lifted a beaming face and smiled up at her long lost son from
under her quaint Quaker-like bonnet. “You haven’t asked me, Alfred, why
my name is Gray?”
“No,” he acknowledged, “I supposed that you would tell me in time if you
had married again.”
She shook her head. “No, I never did. Because I always dressed in grey,
friends began to call me that, and when I came here once more searching
for some trace of you, I thought I would use that name; and I am glad
that I did, for by so doing I won the love of my granddaughter. She might
otherwise have cared merely from a sense of duty.” Then, as they turned
in between two stone gate posts, the man said: “How strange it seems to
be, coming back to our old home. I thought it had been sold for taxes
long ago.”
“It was nearly sold,” Mrs. Gray replied, “but I heard of it in time to
pay the back taxes and keep it. At first I thought, when I couldn’t find
you, that I did not care to own it, for every corner and tree reminded me
of you when you were a boy, but now I am so glad that I have kept our old
home. It is rather dilapidated,” she added brightly, “but in a week or so
we can have it all in readiness before we tell the children a word about
it. Then, when Geraldine is strong enough to be moved, we will bring her
over here.”
“How pleased she will be,” Mr. Morrison declared. “I will go to
Dorchester tomorrow and see about selling our other place and have the
furniture sent down here.”
“I thought we’d let Alfred have the room that was yours when you were a
boy,” Mrs. Gray continued, “and that sunny bay window room which
overlooks the garden is the one I have planned for Geraldine.”
“Mother,” the smiling man protested, “you know how completely I have been
spoiling our girl. You aren’t going to do the same thing, are you?”
The little old lady shook her head. “Geraldine is a changed lassie. She
won’t spoil now.”
“And it’s all due to your loving influence, I am sure,” Mr. Morrison
declared.
There were twinkles in the eyes that looked up at him. “I can’t take all
of the credit,” Mrs. Gray replied. “I think someone else had even more to
do with the change in Geraldine than I have had.”
She was thinking of Jack Lee, but at that time she did not care to tell
her son about him.
The old house was one of those charming places, pillared in front, with
wide halls and large, many windowed rooms that could easily be
transformed into just the kind of a home that Geraldine liked best.
Busy days followed for Mrs. Gray and her son. Then, three weeks later,
Doctor Carson announced that Geraldine was strong enough to be moved.
So well had the secret been kept that the lassie supposed that they were
going to Dorchester.