“He thought I was foolish. I suppose I was.”
Amos said slowly: “Depends on why you did it, Wint. Depends on what was in your mind.”
That set Wint thinking again, trying to decide just what had been in his mind. Amos smoked steadily, not looking at Wint at all. At last he said again:
“Yes, sir, Wint. Depends what was in your mind.”
Wint assented thoughtfully. “I suppose so,” he said.
Amos tried waiting in silence for him to go on; but Wint was busy thinking; he beat Amos at his own game without knowing it. He drove Caretall to ask:
“What was in your mind, Wint?”
The boy groped for words; he flushed uneasily, as though afraid of being laughed at. “Well,” he said, “I had a fool sort of a feeling that I was to blame.”
Amos nodded slowly. “Well,” he said, “that’s what I meant—in a way—when I said you had a job that meant taking care of folks. Hetty, and that old rip—they’re folks, like any one else, like as not.”
“Yes, they are,” Wint agreed.