full of old, old books. There was a fireplace, a winged chair, a broad
couch, a big desk of dark seasoned mahogany, and over the mantel a steel
engraving of Robert E. Lee. The low windows at the back looked out upon
the wooded green of the ascending hill; at the front was a porch which
gave a view of the valley.

Randolph's arrival had had something of the effect of a triumphal entry.
Jefferson had driven him straight to the Schoolhouse, but on the way
they had encountered old Susie, Jefferson's mother, who cooked, and old
Bob, who acted as butler, and the new maid who waited on the table.
These had followed the surrey as a sort of ecstatic convoy. Not a
boarder was in sight but behind the windows of the big house one was
aware of watching eyes.

"They are all crazy to meet you," Randy's mother had told him, as they
came into the Major's sitting-room after those first sacred moments when
the doors had been shut against the world, "they are all crazy to meet
you, but you needn't come over to lunch unless you really care to do it.
Jefferson can serve you here."

"What do you want me to do?"

"My dear, I'm so proud of you, I'd like to show you to the whole world."

"But there are so many of us, Mother."

"There's only one of you----"

"And we haven't come back to be put on pedestals."