Alice Adams--Booth Tarkington [111]
He frowned at her, and asked, "Well, what do you think about it?"
"I don't know," she said. "I don't believe I think anything at all about anything to-day."
"Well, well," he returned; "I expect not; I expect not. You kind of look to me as if you ought to be in bed yourself, young lady."
"Oh, no."
"I guess you mean 'Oh, yes'; and I won't keep you long, but there's something we got to get fixed up, and I'd rather talk to you than I would to your mother, because you're a smart girl and always friendly; and I want to be sure I'm understood. Now, listen."
"I will," Alice promised, smiling faintly.
"I never even hardly noticed your brother was still working for me," he explained, earnestly. "I never thought anything about it. My sons sort of tried to tease me about the way your father--about his taking up this glue business, so to speak--and one day Albert, Junior, asked me if I felt all right about your brother's staying there after that, and I told him--well, I just asked him to shut up. If the boy wanted to stay there, I didn't consider it my business to send him away on account of any feeling I had toward his father; not as long as he did his work right--and the report showed he did. Well, as it happens, it looks now as if he stayed because he HAD to; he couldn't quit because he'd 'a' been found out if he did. Well, he'd been covering up his shortage for a considerable time--and do you know what your father practically charged me with about that?"
"No, Mr. Lamb."
In his resentment, the old gentleman's ruddy face became ruddier and his husky voice huskier. "Thinks I kept the boy there because I suspected him! Thinks I did it to get even with HIM! Do I look to YOU like a man that'd do such a thing?"
"No," she said, gently. "I don't think you would."
"No!" he exclaimed. "Nor HE wouldn't think so if he was himself; he's known me too long. But he must been sort of brooding over this whole business-- I mean before Walter's trouble he must been taking it to heart pretty hard for some time back. He thought I didn't think much of him any more--and I expect he maybe wondered some what I was going to DO--and there's nothing worse'n that state of mind to make a man suspicious of all kinds of meanness. Well, he practically stood up there and accused me to my face of fixing things so't he couldn't ever raise the money to settle for Walter and ask us not to prosecute. That's the state of mind your father's brooding got him into, young lady--charging me with a trick like that!"
"I'm sorry," she said. "I know you'd never----"
The old man slapped his sturdy knee, angrily. "Why, that dang fool of a Virgil Adams!" he exclaimed. "He wouldn't even give me a chance to talk; and he got me so mad I couldn't hardly talk, anyway! He might 'a' known from the first I wasn't going to let him walk in and beat me out of my own--that is, he might 'a' known I wouldn't let him get ahead of me in a business matter--not with my boys twitting me about it every few minutes! But to talk to me the way he did this morning--well, he was out of his head; that's all! Now, wait just a minute," he interposed, as she seemed about to speak. "In the first place, we aren't going to push this case against your brother. I believe in the law, all right, and business men got to protect themselves; but in a case like this, where restitution's made by the family, why, I expect it's just as well sometimes to use a little influence and let matters drop. Of course your brother'll have to keep out o' this state; that's all."
"But--you said----" she faltered.
"Yes. What'd I say?"
"You said, 'where restitution's made by the family.' That's what seemed to trouble papa so terribly, because--because restitution couldn't----"
"Why, yes, it could. That's what I'm here to talk to you about."
"I don't see----"
"I'm going to TELL you, ain't I?" he said, gruffly. "Just hold your horses a minute, please." He coughed, rose from his chair, walked up and down the room, then halted before her. "It's like this," he said. "After I brought your father home, this morning, there