She was sitting there all in a heap, her face in her hands, and her heart in her foolish eyes, when a step sounded near, and a voice humming an old army song.  She knew it; he had taught it to her himself.  She knew the step; for she had long ago trained her slippered feet to keep pace with it.  He had stepped from the wrong side of the car, perhaps, or her eager eyes had missed him; at any rate here he was,—­a young man, with honest eyes, and mouth a little grave; a very plainly dressed young man,—­his coat was not as new as Sharley’s calico,—­but a young man with a good step of his own,—­strong, elastic,—­and a nervous hand.

He passed, humming his army song, and never knew how the world lighted up again within a foot of him.  He passed so near that Sharley by stretching out her hand could have touched him,—­so near that she could hear the breath he drew.  He was thinking to himself, perhaps, that no one had come from home to meet him, and he had been long away; but then, it was not his mother’s fashion of welcome, and quickening his pace at the thought of her, he left the tangle of green behind, and the little wet face crushed breathless up against the grape-leaves, and was out of sight and knew nothing.

Sharley sprang up and bounded home.  Her mother opened her languid eyes wide when the child came in.

“Dear me, Charlotte, how you do go chirping and hopping round, and me with this great baby and my sick-headache! I can’t chirp and hop.  You look as if somebody’d set you on fire!  What’s the matter with you, child?”

What was the matter, indeed!  Sharley, in a little spasm of penitence,—­one can afford to be penitent when one is happy,—­took the baby and went away to think about it.  Surely he would come to see her to-night; he did not often come home without seeing Sharley; and he had been long away.  At any rate he was here; in this very Green Valley where the days had dragged so drearily without him; his eyes saw the same sky that hers saw; his breath drank the same sweet evening wind; his feet trod the roads that she had trodden yesterday, and would tread again to-morrow.  But I will not tell them any more of this,—­shall I, Sharley?

She threw her head back and looked up, as she walked to and fro through the yard with the heavy baby fretting on her shoulder.  The skies were aflame now, for the sun was dropping slowly.  “He is here!” they said.  A belated robin took up the word:  “He is here!” The yellow maple glittered all over with it:  “Sharley, he is here!”

“The butter is here,” called her mother relevantly from the house.  “The butter is here now, and it’s time to see about supper, Charlotte.”

“More calico!” said impatient Sharley, and she gave the baby a jerk.

Whether he came or whether he did not come, there was no more time for Sharley to dream that night.  In fact, there seldom was any time to dream in Mrs. Guest’s household.  Mrs. Guest believed in keeping people busy.  She was busy enough herself when her head did not ache.  When it did, it was the least she could do to see that other people were busy.