"Joy never feasts so high
As when the first course is of misery."
--SUCKLING.
On a pleasant October day the three families--including Miss
Weston--were gathered at Mr. Keith's for a family tea-party; no very
unusual occurrence.
The railroad had recently reached Pleasant Plains, and a few minutes
before the call to tea the whistle of the afternoon train from the West
had been heard.
They had but just seated themselves about the table, and Mr. Keith had
asked a blessing on the food, when the door opened, and a stranger
entered unannounced.
Every one looked up in surprise as he stood silently gazing at the
mother.
The next instant she sprang up with a joyful cry and threw herself into
his outstretched arms, weeping hysterically.
"Don!" was the simultaneous exclamation from the others, and they
gathered about him laughing and crying in joyous excitement.
Yes, it was Don, and no other--Don who went away a smooth-faced boy,
and had come back a bearded man.
With what a rapture of delight they embraced and welcomed him; yet
delight mingled with grief, for how could they forget that two had gone
out from them, and but one had returned? Celestia Ann stood outside
of the circle, leaning her back against the wall and gazing at Don,
the big tears streaming down her homely but kindly face; at length,
stepping forward, she caught his hand in a vise-like grasp, saying,
"It's Mister Don, sure enough, though I wouldn't a knowed him by his
looks. They've all been a-huggin' and kissin' of you, and now it's my
turn," catching him round the neck and giving him a resounding kiss.
"You'll not mind, will you? seein' as I've know'd ye ever since you was
a little feller--a mere baby, as one may say."
"I am very glad to find you here still, Celestia Ann," Don said, with
a good-humored laugh; "and I don't object to the heartiness of your
welcome; for I haven't had a kiss from a woman since I left home, until
to-day."
"Well, no; I reckon not; I shouldn't never b'lieve you was the kind
of a feller to be a-kissin' strange women folks. But now why on airth
don't ye all set down and eat? Mr. Don must be awful hungry a-comin'
all the way from Californy here."
"Most assuredly, if he has had nothing to eat since he started,"
laughed the doctor, resuming his place at the table, all the others
doing likewise.
Then they remembered to introduce the returned wanderer to Flora, who
had been a silent but not unmoved spectator of the little scene.
Far more talking than eating ensued.
Don did greater justice to the viands than most of the others, who
were much occupied in looking at and listening to him; his mother
especially. She feasted her eyes on his face, and lost not a tone of
the voice she had for years feared she might never hear again this side
the grave.
And he was perforce the chief speaker, though he had many questions to
ask of relatives, friends, and acquaintance.
Parents, sisters, and brothers-in-law wanted to know all he had seen,
done, and suffered, and plied him with questions till his mother
remarked they were making him talk too much and giving him no chance to
eat.
"And it is the very best meal I have sat down to since I went away
nearly four years ago; I ought to be allowed to do it justice," laughed
Don.
They were a long while at the table; yet Celestia Ann showed no
impatience, though usually in great haste to "get the table cleared and
the dishes washed up."
But at last they all withdrew to the parlor.
It was verging upon ten o'clock, yet no one seemed to have thought of
bed, though Don might well have been supposed to be tired with his long
and wearisome journey. Mildred and Zillah had taken their babies home,
seen them safely to bed, and, leaving them in the care of their nurses,
returned to the circle gathered in the parlor of their father's house.
Don was telling some of his adventures, and no one but Celestia Ann in
the kitchen noticed the ringing of the door-bell.
She, hastening to answer it, found a tall man, wearing a very heavy
beard and mustache, standing there.
"Good-evening," he said, with a polite inclination of the head; "is
my--is Mrs. Keith in?"
Celestia Ann staggered back, turning very pale in the light of the
lamp that hung suspended from the ceiling. "I--I should say I knowed
that voice if--if the feller that owned it hadn't been killed dead by
the Injuns more'n three years back; leastways so we hearn tell," she
gasped. "Be ye Rupert Keith, or his ghost?"
"I am no ghost, Celestia Ann," he said with a smile. "Reports are
sometimes quite untrue, as was the one you speak of."
She grasped his hand, and burst out sobbing for very joy.
"There, there!" he said kindly, "I am afraid mother will hear and be
alarmed. If she should hurry out and find me here--so unexpectedly, it
might be more than she could well bear."
"Yes, she'd ought to be prepared; 'specially as she's had one great
surprise a'ready to day in Don's comin'--"
"What, is Don here? just returned?" he cried. "Oh, but that is good
news! They're in the parlor, I think; I'll go into the sitting-room
and get you to call Dr. Landreth out (the rest will suppose he's wanted
to see a patient), and he can prepare my mother."
"A first-rate plan, Mr. Rupert," said Celestia Ann. Waiting till he
reached the door of the sitting-room, she opened that of the parlor.
"Doctor," she said, "there's a man out here a-wantin' to speak to ye."
"Oh, I hope it isn't a call to the country," remarked Mildred, as her
husband made haste to obey the summons.
The conversation in the parlor went on, no one supposing the caller a
person in whom any of them had an interest.
As the doctor entered the sitting-room the stranger rose and held out
his hand. "Very glad to see you again, Dr. Landreth. You have not
forgotten me?" he said inquiringly, and with a humorous look.
"I am afraid I have, sir; if ever I had the pleasure of your
acquaintance," was the reply, as the offered hand was taken, and the
doctor gazed doubtfully into the bronzed and bearded face.
"Ah, Charlie, is your memory so short?" Rupert asked in a
half-reproachful tone, holding fast his brother-in-law's hand and
looking him steadily in the eyes.
"Why!" gasped the doctor, "it isn't, it can't be--"
"Yes, it can be, and it is," laughed Rupert, though his voice trembled
with emotion; "God has mercifully spared me and brought me back again
to my father's house. Are all well? Can you prepare my mother for the
news that I am yet alive and here?"
"In a moment--when I have myself so far recovered from the shock as to
be fully able to control my voice," answered the doctor jocosely, but
with a very perceptible tremble in his tones. "My dear fellow, if I am
so overcome with happiness, what will she be?"
"Joy seldom kills?" Rupert said interrogatively.
"Rarely; and yet it has been fatal in some instances. We must move with
caution."
He stepped into the hall, opened the parlor door, and called softly to
his wife.