And now those three interminable years were gone, and Sara was
coming home. She wrote him nothing of her aunt's pleadings and reproaches
and ready, futile tears; she wrote only that she would graduate
in June and start for home a week later. Thenceforth Old Man Shaw
went about in a state of beatitude, making ready for her homecoming.
As he sat on the bench in the sunshine, with the blue sea
sparkling and crinkling down at the foot of the green slope,
he reflected with satisfaction that all was in perfect order.
There was nothing left to do save count the hours until that beautiful,
longed-for day after to-morrow. He gave himself over to a reverie,
as sweet as a day-dream in a haunted valley.
The red roses were out in bloom. Sara had always loved those red roses--
they were as vivid as herself, with all her own fullness of life
and joy of living. And, besides these, a miracle had happened
in Old Man Shaw's garden. In one corner was a rose-bush which had
never bloomed, despite all the coaxing they had given it--"the
sulky rose-bush," Sara had been wont to call it. Lo! this summer had
flung the hoarded sweetness of years into plentiful white blossoms,
like shallow ivory cups with a haunting, spicy fragrance.
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