“You bother about my chances of meeting a submarine when you are planning to go up into the air with that Mr. Stillinger! You will be more likely to meet the Hun in the air than I shall in the water.”
“Pooh! I am just going on a joy ride in an airplane. While you——”
“It is not just a joy ride I shall take, I admit, Tom,” Ruth said, more seriously. “I do hate to give up my work here and go home. Yet this letter,” and she tapped the missive from Uncle Jabez, “makes me feel that perhaps I have duties near the Red Mill.”
“Uh-huh!” he grunted understandingly.
“You know I have been running around and having good times for a good many years. Aunt Alvirah is getting old. And perhaps Uncle Jabez should be considered, too.”
“He’s an awful old grouch, Ruth,” said Tom Cameron, shaking his head.
“I know. But he really has been kind to me—in his way. And if he has had to close down the mill, and is making no money, he will surely feel pretty bad. Somebody must be there to cheer him up.”
“He don’t need to run that mill,” said Tom shortly. “He has plenty of money invested in one way or another.”
“But he doesn’t think he is earning anything unless the mill runs and he sees the dollars increasing in his strong box. You know, he counts his ready cash every night before he goes to bed. It is almost all the enjoyment he has.”
“He’s a blessed old miser!” exclaimed her friend, “I don’t see how you have stood him all these years, Ruthie.”