It’s good to see all of you.
Good to hear new voices again.”
“Is the pellet working?”
“Fine.
Here we go!”
They walked on up the hill.
“Alice, come see who’s here!”
Hathaway frowned and bent into the hut.
“Alice, did you hear?”
His wife appeared.
A moment later the two daughters, tall and gracious, came out, followed by an even taller son.
“Alice, you remember Captain Wilder?”
She hesitated and looked at Hathaway as if for instructions and then smiled.
“Of course, Captain Wilder!”
“I remember, we had dinner together the night before I took off for Jupiter, Mrs. Hathaway.”
She shook his hand vigorously.
“My daughters, Marguerite and Susan.
My son, John.
You remember the captain, surely?”
Hands were shaken amid laughter and much talk.
Captain Wilder sniffed the air.
“Is that gingerbread?”
“Will you have some?”
Everyone moved.
Folding tables were hurried out while hot foods were rushed forth and plates and fine damask napkins and good silverware were laid.
Captain Wilder stood looking first at Mrs. Hathaway and then at her son and her two tall, quiet-moving daughters.
He looked into their faces as they darted past and he followed every move of their youthful hands and every expression of their wrinkleless faces.
He sat upon a chair the son brought.
“How old are you, John?”
The son replied, “Twenty-three.”
Wilder shifted his silverware clumsily.
His face was suddenly pale.
The man next to him whispered,
“Captain Wilder, that can’t be right.”
The son moved away to bring more chairs.
“What’s that, Williamson?”
“I’m forty-three myself, Captain.
I was in school the same time as young John Hathaway there, twenty years ago.
He says he’s only twenty-three now; he only looks twenty-three.
But that’s wrong.
He should be forty-two, at least.
What’s it mean, sir?”
“I don’t know.”
“You look kind of sick, sir.”
“I don’t feel well.
The daughters, too, I saw them twenty years or so ago; they haven’t changed, not a wrinkle.
Will you do me a favor? I want you to run an errand, Williamson.
I’ll tell you where to go and what to check.
Late in the breakfast, slip away.
It should take you only ten minutes.