Amy... Six, Seven... But there should be Eight... Seven..." and Mrs.
Cole saying: "And there's my brown bag. The little one with the black
handle," and Helen saying. "OO, was it adidums, then Nandy-Pandy,
Nandy-Pandy..." and Miss Jones: "Now, Mary! Now, Jeremy! Now, Helen!";
although this was going on just as it always had gone on, his eyes were
searching for the wagonette. Ah, there it was! He could just see the top
of it beyond the iron bridge, and Jim, the man from the Farm, would
be coming down to help with the boxes; yes, there he was crossing the
bridge now, with his red face and broad shoulders, and the cap on the
side of his head, just as he always wore it. Jeremy recognised him with
a strange, little choking sensation. It was "coming home" to him, all
this was--the great event of his life, and as he looked at the others he
realised, young as he was, that none of them felt it as he did, and the
realisation gave him a strange feeling, half of gratification, half
of loneliness. He stood there, a little apart from the rest of them,
clutching his box, and holding on to Hamlet's lead, feeling so deeply
excited that his heart was like a hard, cold stone jumping up and down,
bump, bump, behind his waistcoat.

"That's Jim! That's Jim!" he whispered in a hoarse gasp to Miss Jones.

"Now mind, dear," she answered in her kindly, groping voice. "You'll be
falling on to the rail if you aren't careful."

It strangely annoyed him that his father should greet Jim just as though
he were some quite ordinary man in Polchester. He himself waited in a
strange agitation until Jim should notice him. The man turned at last,
bending down to pick up a box, saw him, touched his cap, smiling a
long, crooked smile, and Jeremy blushed with happiness. It was the first
recognition that he had had from the farm, and it pleased him.

They all moved up to the higher road. Uncle Samuel, coming on at the
last, in a dreamy, moody way, stopping on the bridge to look down at the
railway-line, and then suddenly saying aloud:

"Their minds are full of the number of boxes, and whether they'll get
tea, and who's to pay what, and 'How badly I want a wash!' and already
to-morrow they'll be wondering whether they oughn't to be getting home
to Polchester. All sham! All sham!"

He wasn't speaking to Jeremy, but to himself. However, Jeremy said: "Did
you see Jim, Uncle?"

"No, I did not."

"He's fatter and redder than last year."

"I shouldn't wonder