CHAPTER VI.

AN UNEXPECTED ARRIVAL.

IT was not very late when Mrs. Arundel reached the farm.

Hearing the noise of wheels before she expected it, Mrs. Ross came to the door to see, and Mrs. Arundel told her that this first day the excitement had been rather too much for Tom, and that they had come home to rest.

Simmons and she soon tucked him up comfortably on the little sofa in the tiny sitting room, and with his tired eyes watching his mother sit down to her desk, he soon forgot himself, and fell peacefully asleep.

About half-past one the beach party began to return. Nurse and the little ones first, and very soon Nellie and all the rest.

When they were at tea that evening, Netta spied the postman coming up the hill. And there was a general rush to the door, in which, however, poor Netta, being small, lost her chance. Ada was the successful one, and laid the letter down in triumph before her mother.

"From papa!" she said.

Mrs. Arundel opened it in silence; while the children looked on expectantly.

"Oh, Nellie!" said Mrs. Arundel, "Who do you think has come? Oh, Nellie!"

Nellie turned pale; and Mrs. Arundel read—

"Prepare yourselves for a great surprise. When I was seated at my solitary tea on Saturday evening, the door opened, and Walter walked in! Yes, my dear son from India! But he must tell you all about it himself. When he has finished his business, he will come down to South Bay, about Wednesday, I suppose; so tell Nellie to keep back her impatience till then. I am too busy to say more to-day."

Nellie's colour came again; but she burst into tears.

Mrs. Arundel rose quickly, and putting her arm round her shoulder, kissed her affectionately. "Dear Nellie, how nice it will be," she said; "don't cry; I am afraid I did not prepare you enough."

Nellie's tears caused general consternation; and when she looked up and saw the woe-begone faces of her little sisters, she could not help laughing, which astonished them much. So she soon recovered, and once more they settled to their tea, and to the joyful anticipations of Walter's visit.

Arthur and Ada were very full of it, and, to judge by what they said, intended to monopolise him entirely. Nellie looked radiant after her first agitation was over, and Mrs. Arundel sympathised so thoroughly with her, that she looked radiant too. The children were so excited with this news that they soon finished tea, and almost without asking permission set off for a walk inland, leaving everything scattered about.

Their mother began to put the room to rights. "They will have to be tidy," she said emphatically, half aloud; "for if everyone throws everything down, we shall not be able to move."

On the eventful Wednesday, dinner was soon swallowed, and four or five of them hurried off to meet the three o'clock train.

Tom was lifted across on his couch to the grass in the orchard, where he lay looking up into the trees, and thinking. His little telescope was held tightly in one thin hand; and the other stretched out listlessly, catching at the grass and clover.

Mrs. Arundel came over the road to glance at him, and he looked up in her face as if wishing to say something. She knew the look, and waited.

"I suppose they are all very glad about Walter?" he said gravely.

"Very glad; it is so nice for us."

"It will not be nice for me; I shall not wish to see him; I don't remember him."

"But, dear Tom, he is your brother, and so kind, and when you know him, you will love him."

"No, mamma, I shall not," he answered quietly; "nothing makes any difference to me. They will all be off for walks away from me. No; I wish he were not coming."

Mrs. Arundel could not keep back a sigh, and Tom was quick to perceive it. He hated himself for his petulance, and yet he felt unable to overcome it.

"You must watch for them coming up the lane, dear," she said, trying to speak cheerfully; "and when you first hear them or see them, give a sound on your little whistle and I will come out."

"All right!" said Tom, with a trifle more energy. And then finding he could look up into the trees with his telescope, he began to adjust it, and Mrs. Arundel went indoors.

Tom was the first to hear the sound of the approaching party, and in his excitement gave a very shrill whistle, which brought his mother running out long before anything was to be seen.

But in a few minutes, they came within sight over the brow of the little hill. Nellie, looking the picture of happiness, leaning on the arm of a sunburnt, pleasant young man of about twenty-two, who was laughing and talking, and holding Isabel by his disengaged hand.

The others were conveying his bag, umbrella, &c.; for Walter certainly should not have anything to carry this first day.

He came forward quickly when he saw his stepmother, and kissed her affectionately; and before Tom had time to object, he had stooped and kissed him also, saying with a sweet smile, "Ah, Tom! Here's somebody come that will be able to push you along finely!"

Tom looked astonished, and then a little ashamed as his eyes rested on his mother's face. And her touched and grateful smile set him thinking even in that moment of arrival how it was that his mother could love him so much. He thought he would ask her some day.

After tea nobody seemed inclined to walk down into the town again, so they gathered round their mother and Walter in the orchard. And with the sweet air blowing up gently from the sea, and the scent of the flowers coming over from the garden, he explained to them how it was that he came so suddenly, and what were his plans.

"I should not have taken you by surprise if I could have helped it; but one of the partners of our firm was coming over on business, and was thrown from his horse and seriously hurt at the last moment. They were obliged to send someone trustworthy, and luckily fixed on me; so with only twenty-four hours' notice I was off, instead of him, in the steamer in which his passage was taken."

"Jolly!" said Arthur.

"Very," answered Walter, smiling; "for I should not have come in such style on my own account."

"How long are you likely to be able to stay?" asked Mrs. Arundel. "Or perhaps you do not know?"

"I think three clear months. So, as my father tells me you are here for a month, if you will have me, I have come to stay."

"Indeed we will," said Mrs. Arundel; "and shall only be too delighted."

"I have brought something for all of you to do!"

"Have you?" said Arthur. "What sort of thing?"

"Ah! I am going to leave you in uncertainty till the day after to-morrow."

"What an age!" exclaimed Ada. "But, after all, I do not expect it will be anything nice to do."

Nellie looked pained. "I dare say it will, Ada; Walter would not propose anything disagreeable."

"We shall see," said Ada.

"I am sure it will be nice," said Isabel; "for Walter looks so kind!"

"Dear little girl!" he said. "I am glad you trust me."

[Illustration]

[Illustration]