Phebe, Her Profession - A Sequel to Teddy: Her Book | Page 4

heart, the low hillocks crowned with clusters of shaggy oaks still thick with unshed leaves, the strips of salt marsh with the haycocks like gigantic beehives, the peeps of blue sea, sail-dotted or crossed by a thin line of smoke, and the neat little towns so characteristic of southern New England. Impulsively she turned to her husband.
"Oh, don't you pity Hope, Billy?"
"What for?"
"To live out there. I suppose Archie's business makes it a necessity; but I do wish he would come back and settle down near us."
"He would be like a bull in a china shop, Teddy. Fancy Archie Holden, after having all the Rocky Mountains for his workshop, coming back and settling down into one of these bandboxy little towns! He is better off, out there."
"Perhaps. But isn't it good to get back again?"
He looked at her in some perplexity.
"I thought you were having such a good time, Ted."
"I was, a beautiful one; but I am so glad to see blue, deep water again. I was perfectly happy, while I was there; but now I feel as if I couldn't wait to be in our own home again, Billy, and gossip with you after dinner in the library. People are so in the way. It will be like a second honeymoon, with nobody to interrupt us."
He laughed at her enthusiasm.
"Old married people like us! But you will mourn for Mac, Ted; you know you will."
Forgetting the familiar landscape, she turned to face him with a laugh which chased all the dreaminess from her eyes.
"Billy Farrington! But did you ever know such a mockery of fate?"
"As Mac?"
"Yes, as Hope's having such a child?"
"It is a little incongruous."
"It is preposterous. Hope was always the meek angel of the household, and Archie is not especially obstreperous. But Mac--" Theodora's pause was expressive.
Billy laughed.
"He combines the face of an angel and the wisdom of a serpent," he remarked. "I don't know whether his morals or his vocabulary are more startling. Hope has her hands full; but she will find a way to manage him, even if she can't learn from her own childhood, as you could."
"Thank you, dear. Your compliments are always charming. Perhaps I wasn't an angel-child; but you generally aided and abetted me in my misdeeds. I do hope, though, that Mac will grow in grace before they come East, next summer."
Her husband glanced up, started slightly, then leaned back in his chair while a sudden look of amusement came into his blue eyes. The next moment, Theodora sprang up with a glad exclamation.
"Hu!"
The train had stopped, and a young man had come into the car, given a quick look at the passengers and then marched straight to Mrs. Farrington's chair. Resting his hands on her shoulders, he bent down and laid his cheek against hers, and Theodora, regardless of the people about her, turned and cast herself into his arms. Tall and lithe and singularly alike in face, it scarcely needed a second glance to show that they were not only brother and sister, but twins as well. Moreover, in spite of Hubert's successful business life and Theodora's devotion to her husband, the twins were as necessary to each other as the blades of a pair of scissors.
"How well you are looking! Have you missed me? Aren't you glad to see us back? How are they all at home?" she demanded breathlessly.
Her brother laughed, as he shook hands with Billy.
"Steady, Ted! One at a time. You haven't lost your old trick of asking questions. We are all well, and I left the mother alternately peering out of the front window of our house and punching up the pillows on the couch in your library."
"And papa?"
"Splendid, and covered with glory for his last operation on the Gaylord child. It is the talk of the town."
Theodora's eyes flashed proudly.
"Isn't he wonderful? If he had never had a patient but Billy, he might have been content. I wish you could be half the man he is, Hu."
"I do my endeavors, Ted."
"Yes, and you are a boy to be proud of, even if you aren't a doctor," she answered. "You look as if the last five months had agreed with you."
"They have, for I didn't have anybody around to torment me, and I grew fat and sleek from day to day. How is Hope?"
"As well as is compatible with being Mac's mother."
"What is the matter with him? You didn't write much."
"No; for I knew you wouldn't believe the half of my tales. Hu, the boy is an imp."
"He combines the least lovely traits of Teddy and Babe," Mr. Farrington remarked gravely.
"I was never half so original and daring as he is," Theodora said regretfully. "My iniquities were trite; his are fresh from the recesses of his own brain. He is a cunning child, Hu,