William, wrapped in a poshteen - a silk-embroidered sheepskin jacket
trimmed with rough astrakhan - looked out with moist eyes and
nostrils that dilated joyously. The South of pagodas and palm-trees,
the overpopulated Hindu South, was done with. Here was the land she
knew and loved, and before her lay the good life she understood,
among folk of her own caste and mind.
They were picking them up at almost every station now - men and
women coming in for the Christmas Week, with racquets, with bundles
of polo-sticks, with dear and bruised cricket-bats, with fox-terriers
and saddles. The greater part of them wore jackets like William's,
for the Northern cold is as little to be trifled with as the Northern
heat. And William was among them and of them, her hands deep in her
pockets, her collar turned up over her ears, stamping her feet on
the platforms as she walked up and down to get warm, visiting from
carriage to carriage and everywhere being congratulated. Scott was
with the bachelors at the far end of the train, where they chaffed
him mercilessly about feeding babies and milking goats; but from
time to time he would stroll up to William's window, and murmur:
"Good enough, isn't it?" and William would answer with sighs of pure
delight: "Good enough, indeed.
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