CHAPTER XV

THE DAY AT LAST

"If it rains to-morrow I think I shall die," Janet said as she got ready for bed that night.

She need have had no fears, for the next day dawned clear, with just enough of autumn chill in the air to whip the color into your cheeks. Tom's telegram had said that they would arrive by the same train that he had come by.

Janet wished it had been an earlier one, but the day passed more quickly than she had hoped. In the morning she drove Clinker out into the woods and came back with the cart full of brilliant autumn leaves.

As she drove back through the village it seemed as though every one stopped her to ask when Phyllis was coming. She told them all, and her excitement mounted every time she uttered the magic words but toward afternoon the fear that had depressed her the day before returned and she could not shake it off. She felt suddenly very shy. When train time came it was all she could do not to fly to the Enchanted Kingdom and hide, as she had done on the day of the fair. She walked up and down the platform in a fever of excitement, and her hands were icy cold.

Old Mr. Jenkins came out from the ticket office to talk to her.

"Quite a day for you, isn't it?" he asked with evident interest. "Can't say as I ever heard of another case quite like it. To have a twin sister that you never saw and didn't even know you had! I often wondered when you'd find it out."

"Did you know all about it?" Janet asked in surprise.

"I should say I did." Mr. Jenkins nodded his head to give further weight to his words.

"I wonder why no one ever told me," Janet said more to herself than to him.

Mr. Jenkins chuckled.

"I kinda guess all the folks that knew about it, knew your grandmother didn't want it told, and perhaps you've noticed folks have a way of doing things like she wants."

"I suppose that was it," Janet agreed idly. "Isn't that the train?" she asked a minute later as a faint rumble became audible.

Mr. Jenkins consulted his watch.

"Wouldn't wonder if it were," he said. "I'd better be getting the mail bags ready."

Janet couldn't very well ask him to wait, but she watched his retreating figure with a sinking feeling around her heart. At least he was somebody to talk to, and anything was better than being alone. She could feel her heart pounding, and something in her throat seemed to interfere with her breathing.

Never did a train take so long to slow up and finally stop, but Janet found herself suddenly wishing that it would take twice as long.

The first person to alight was Tom, and he took time to wave to her before he turned to help down a slender little lady dressed in pearl gray. Janet started forward to meet them, and then stopped short for she saw herself stepping off the train; eyes, hair, straight little nose, even to the solitary dimple in the left cheek. She was carrying a basket and she was laughing at Tom. Then she looked up and stopped too.

The Page twins stared at each other.

"Janet!" Phyllis was the first to regain the power of speech. She dropped her basket into Tom's arms and ran forward.

The next thing Janet knew she was being kissed and hugged.

"Oh, you adorable love!" Phyllis exclaimed rapturously. "Isn't it all perfectly thrilling and fairy-taleish? I could just eat you alive, I am so excited. Please say right away that you are going to love me or I shall die of misery."

Poor Janet! She had never heard so many adjectives in all her life and the speed with which Phyllis rattled on dumbfounded her. Miss Carter, Aunt Mog, came to her rescue.

"Phyllis, my love, do stop talking and give some one else a chance to say how do you do to Janet." She laughed. "Janet, my dear, I am your Aunt Mog, and I am, oh, so very happy to see you."

Janet kissed her and murmured, "Thank you."

"Well, don't I get a kiss, little sister of mine?" Tom inquired in his deep, good-natured voice.

At the sound of it Janet found her tongue.

"Of course you do!" she exclaimed. "Oh, I am so happy, I can't think of anything to say," she confessed shyly.

"You precious love, that's just exactly the way I feel!" Phyllis could not keep still another instant. "There are all sorts of funny little chills miming up and down my back and--oh, for goodness' sakes, Tommy, what are you doing to Sir Galahad!" She snatched the basket away from Tom and lifted out a huge tortoise-shell cat with a big blue bow around his neck.

Boru, who had been sniffing at Tom's side, gave a sudden jump, and Janet caught him just in time to save the cat.

"Get down, sir," she scolded, "and don't you dare to touch that cat. Do you understand?" Boru slunk away with his tail between his legs.

"Poor kitty, did he frighten you? I'm so sorry,"--Janet stroked the ruffled fur comfortingly.

Phyllis laughed. "What a time we will have with those two!" she exclaimed; "but they'll make friends sooner or later. Sir Galahad is just as much to blame as your dog. He has no manners when it comes to dogs. Go back in your basket, you're in disgrace."

"Let's make at least a start for home," Tom suggested. "I'm hungry."

"There's a wagon to carry up your bags," Janet said, "but I'm afraid we will have to walk."

"Oh, yes, let's do start. I'm simply crazy to see the house and grandmother and Martha. Here, Tommy, you carry puss, now that you have no bags. I'm going to walk with Janet. You and Auntie Mogs can bring up the rear."

"You are going to do no such thing," her aunt contradicted her smilingly. "I don't want Janet deaf by the time we reach the house, and besides I want to talk to her myself."

She took Janet's arm and started off, and Phyllis and Tom followed.

"Phyllis doesn't always talk as much as this," she said as they walked along; "she is just excited to-day."

"Oh, but I love it," Janet said quickly. "She's--well she's everything she said I was." She looked at her companion and smiled. Miss Carter was a dainty little lady, Janet thought she looked as though she had just stepped down from a Dresden vase, her cheeks were such a soft shell pink and her eyes such a delicate china blue. Unconsciously she looked down at her feet; they were nearly small enough to fit the slippers in the trunk in the attic.

"Oh, Janet, do tell me who lives in that cunning little house!" Phyllis called.

"The Waters," Janet told her; "that's Harry looking out of the barn door."

Phyllis laughed merrily. "Oh, but he's fat," she cried. "Do you know him!"

"Yes."

"Like him?"

"Not much."

"Why!"

"Isn't he the boy who is afraid of snakes?" Tom asked, laughing.

"Yes."

"Well, I don't blame him for that!" Phyllis exclaimed. "I'm scared to death of the crawly things myself, but I do think he is a little bit too fat." She chattered on and succeeded in monopolizing the conversation until they reached the house. At the first glimpse of it she went into ecstasies.

"It's perfect," she announced from the garden gate. "Oh, Janet, do love me so that I can stay here always. There's a real sundial! Auntie Mogs, do look. Tommy, you never told me about it. And what ducky little white flowers!"

In the hall she was equally enthusiastic over the grandfather's clock and the big brass warming pan.

Martha met them at the door, arrayed in a stiff white apron, her face shiny with soap applied vigorously.

Before she had a chance to speak, Phyllis was shaking her hand.

"You're Martha," she said. "I'm awfully glad to know you."

Martha turned to Miss Carter. "She said that like Master Tom," she said.

Aunt Mog smiled. "Yes, she is very like her father," she said. "I see it so often. It's queer, isn't it! Janet is more like her mother."

"She is, indeed, ma'm, even in her ways." Martha spoke proudly, and she looked at Janet affectionately.

"Won't you be coming up to your room? You must be tired."

They all followed her upstairs, Phyllis leading the way and once more carrying her cat.

Tom brought up the rear, carrying the bags, which had arrived a few minutes before from the station.

"I must change my dress before I see grandmother," Phyllis said as she opened a big suitcase, "but I won't be a minute, so stay and talk to me while I wash in this adorable basin," she said to Janet.

Aunt Mog took off her hat and with a smile, which neither of the girls noticed, she slipped from the room and joined Tom at the foot of the stairs.

"It's quite perfect, as Phyllis says," she laughed, "and now suppose I go in and say 'how do you do' to Mrs. Page."

When the girls came down a few minutes later they heard voices and Tom's hearty laugh. Janet sighed with relief and opened the door softly.

"Grandmother," she said in the hushed voice she always used in that room, "here is Phyllis."

Before Mrs. Page had had time really to look at her other granddaughter, Phyllis had kissed her warmly on both cheeks and was rattling on in her joyful way.

"Grandmother, isn't this fun!" she demanded. "I'm so glad to see you. Why, only just imagine, I never knew you existed until Tom came out of the skies and told me about you and Janet. You can imagine, can't you, how surprised I was, and of course I've been simply crazy to see you ever since."

"Phyllis dearest, be careful; I'm afraid you'll tire your grandmother with so much chattering," Aunt Mog admonished gently.

"Let the child alone, Marjorie," Mrs. Page snapped.

"Oh, but I'm sorry," Phyllis was contrite at once, "I always forget, and you know you don't look a bit sick, grandmother, even though you are in bed. Here, let me shake up your pillows for you. They don't look half puffy enough to be really comfortable." She suited the action to the word, and in the twinkling of an eye the pillows were re-arranged to her satisfaction.

"Keep still a minute, child," Mrs. Page said not unkindly; "I want to look at you."

Phyllis smiled down at her, and stood as still as it was possible for her.

"I wish you would all leave me now," Mrs. Page said when she had studied each of Phyllis's features in turn. "Come in and say good night to me, child, when Janet comes."

They left her, and the girls went into the garden. Janet was too surprised to voice her thoughts, but Phyllis did not seem even to know that she had done anything out of the ordinary. She dismissed her grandmother with "she's really a love," and returned to more important subjects.

By evening she knew all about the Enchanted Kingdom, Peter, Mrs. Todd and the Blake girls, and she had moved her suitcase into Janet's room, "for--" she said--"what is the use of having a sister if you can't sleep with her and talk over things with her in the dark."

Miss Carter and Tom, sitting in the living-room before the fire, heard the buzz of their voices late into the night.

"How alike they are," she said, smiling. "And yet how absolutely different."

Tom nodded. "And to think they're both my sisters; bless 'em, do you know, Auntie Mogs, I'm a very proud man this night!"

Auntie Mogs leaned over and patted his hand in understanding.

"They must never be separated again," she said with decision.