It was the first week in March which found her seated in the centre of a Pullman car of the Florida Limited of the Atlantic Coast Line.
The train had pa.s.sed Richmond and was sweeping through the desolate broom-sedge fields still furrowed by those mortal trenches around Petersburg.
Her father had been killed in one of those trenches, a gallant colonel cheering a ragged handful of half-starved men in gray, unmindful of the order of retreat until engulfed by the grand army that swept over them like a tidal wave.
She took the children into the dining-car and found every table full except one, and two seats at that one already reserved. Lucy was placed next to the window, Frank next to the aisle, and the mother crowded between them with an arm encircling each.
She had given the order to the waiter, and was pointing out to Lucy the lines of the battle-field on which her father had died.
"There, dear, it is," she said, with a tremor in her voice, pointing to an angle in the trench on the crest of a ridge. "There is where grandfather was killed."
While Lucy looked and Frank climbed into her lap and was peering out the window, the conductor placed a beautiful woman and tall, distinguished-looking man in the reserved seats at the same table, opposite.
The boy turned, still on his knees, in his mother"s lap, and faced the newcomers, whom Ruth had not been able to see for the child"s movements.
He stared for a moment at the man with wide-dilated eyes, his body suddenly stiffened, and with a half sob, half cry, he sprang to the floor.
"Look! Mama, dear--look! It"s Papa!"
He threw himself on Gordon, and his little arms held his neck convulsively.
The man blushed like a girl as his great trembling fingers smoothed the boy"s hair.
Kate"s face was scarlet, Ruth turned pink and white, and Lucy, trembling and sobbing, began to scramble across her mother"s lap.
The boy"s hands tenderly framed his father"s crimson cheeks, he kissed him, and again and again his arms clung in pa.s.sionate clasp about his neck.
"Oh, Papa, we"ve got you at last! Why didn"t you come? We"ve been praying, Lucy and me, every night for you, and we thought you"d never come back. Mama said you"d gone a long, long way--"
Ruth was choking with emotion, and yet she smiled through her tears. She knew those tiny hands were deep down in the man"s soul sweeping his heart-strings with wild, sweet music.
The brunette looked across the table into the trembling face of the fair one. The dark eyes were now tranquil, whatever the storm within. A faint sinile suffused her face with mantling blushes.
Lucy pulled the boy"s arms from around her father"s neck and slipped her own softer, slender ones there. She kissed him, and laid her brown curls on his breast. Her little hands patted his broad shoulder, and she murmured:
"Papa, dear, I love you!"
Kate attempted to rise, bit her lip, and fairly hissed in Gordon"s ear:
"End this scene! Find another table!"
Gordon drew Lucy"s arm from his neck and whispered:
"They are all filled, my dear."
The blue eyes blazed with fury as she cried under her breath:
"Get up and let me out!"
Gordon gently drew the children"s arms away, placed them back in their seats, rose, still blushing, and accompanied Kate back into their car.
At first the boy was too astonished to speak or protest. When he found his voice he whispered in wonder:
"Mama, who is she?"
Ruth placed a finger on her trembling lips and shook her head.
"Will she let him come back?" he asked, anxiously.
"Hush, dear," the mother said, softly.
The boy put his arms on the table and burst into tears.
Lucy sat very quiet, glancing into her mother"s face wistfully. And then she felt under the table, found one of her hands and began to stroke it gently.
When Gordon returned to his car, immediately behind the one in which Ruth was riding, Kate sat for half an hour in furious silence, refusing to speak or answer a question. He had never seen her so beside herself with anger.
She turned on him in a sudden flash and asked with frowning emphasis:
"I wonder why you dragged me off on this idiotic trip?"
"I was worn out and needed the rest," he answered, quietly.
She looked at him with defiance.
"I don"t believe a word of it," she said, indignantly. "You wish to get me out of New York. You were too much of a coward to tell Overman your suspicions that he was trying to win your wife."
Gordon looked out of the window in silence.
"We will stop at the next station and go back. I don"t care for any more free vaudeville shows in the dining-car."
"Don"t be absurd, my dear; you need not meet again."
Gordon smiled in spite of himself.
Tears of vexation filled the violet eyes. "For all of your loud talk of freedom, I believe you still love that first wife of yours!
And I am beginning to despise you."
"Come, Kate, this is too absurd. How could I help the accident of such a meeting? I had not seen the children since our separation.
She has always taught them to love me. How could I prevent it if I wished?"
"Yes; and you love her, too," she insisted stubbornly, and the full red lips trembled and parted, and then softened into a--smile.
"But don"t flatter yourself I care, or am jealous, because this scene has humiliated and angered me. You"re not worth a moment"s jealousy, you great hulking baby!"
Gordon pressed the b.u.t.ton and ordered a lunch served in their seat, and smilingly refused to continue the quarrel.
When the train crossed the North Carolina line it ran into the belt of the advancing spring rains from the South. At Wilson, it was pouring in torrents and had been raining steadily for two days.
At Fayetteville, the train was an hour late, delayed by a washout.