“No. And I don’t believe he will. He’s done with politics, Shevlin tells me. Got religion, Billy says, and——”
“If Pete Brayle’s got religion, you can gamble he’s got it in his wife’s name, like every other asset of his. ‘Done with politics,’ eh? Well, politics ain’t done with him. I’ll see Shevlin about it in the morning.”
“I thought Mr. Brayle was an atheist,” put in Letty. “It’s an awful thing to be. How do you suppose he ever became one?”
“By thinking too hard with a mind that was too small; same as most atheists do,” suggested Caleb. “Say, Jerry,” he added, “it won’t do you no harm to know I’m rather tickled at the way you’ve took hold at Headquarters this past week or so. You won’t lose by it.”
“She wrote me to,” answered Gerald, flushing. “You owe it to her. Not to me.”
“She?”
“Yes. My——”
“Ugh! I might ’a’ known it! Well, so long as you do your work I don’t care where the inspiration comes from. I ain’t too finicky to hit a straight blow with a crooked stick. Why’d she tell you to hustle?”
“She said she ‘hoped it would touch your hard heart.’ Wait, and I’ll read you what she——”
“No, you won’t. My hardness of heart isn’t a patch on my hardness of hearing when it comes to listening to that sort of pink paper drivel. I——”