V
The son was to arrive by way of Montreal, and at eleven o’clock we left Sheener’s room for the station. There was a flower stand on the corner, and Sheener bought a red carnation and fixed it in the old man’s buttonhole. “That’s the way the boy’ll know him,” he told me. “They ain’t seen each other for—since the boy was a kid.”
Evans accepted the attention querulously; he was trembling and feeble, yet held his head high. We took the subway, reached the station, sat down for a space in the waiting room.
But Evans was impatient; he wanted to be out in the train shed, and we went out there and walked up and down before the gate. I noticed that he was studying Sheener with some embarrassment in his eyes. Sheener was, of course, an unprepossessing figure. Lean, swarthy, somewhat flashy of dress, he looked what he was. He was my friend, of course, and I was able to look beneath the exterior. But it seemed to me that sight of him distressed Evans.
In the end the old man said, somewhat furtively: “I say, you know, I want to meet my boy alone. You won’t mind standing back a bit when the train comes in.”
“Sure,” Sheener told him. “We won’t get in the way. You’ll see. He’ll pick you out in a minute, old man. Leave it to me.”
Evans nodded. “Quite so,” he said with some relief. “Quite so, to be sure.”
So we waited. Waited till the train slid in at the end of the long train shed. Sheener gripped the old man’s arm. “There he comes,” he said sharply. “Take a brace, now. Stand right there, where he’ll spot you when he comes out. Right there, bo.”
“You’ll step back a bit, eh, what?” Evans asked.
“Don’t worry about us,” Sheener told him. “Just you keep your eye skinned for the boy. Good luck, bo.”