“What children?”
“Jane and that little girl from across the street—Kirsted, her name must be.”
“No. I did not.”
“I just wondered,” Mrs. Baxter said, timidly. “Genesis thinks he heard the little Kirsted girl telling Jane she had plenty of money for carfare. He thinks they went somewhere on a street-car. I thought maybe you noticed wheth—”
“I told you I did not.”
“All right,” she said, placatively. “I didn't mean to bother you, dear.”
Following this there was a silence; but no sound of receding footsteps indicated Mrs. Baxter's departure from the other side of the closed door.
“Well, what you WANT?” William shouted.
“Nothing—nothing at all,” said the compassionate voice. “I just thought I'd have lunch a little later than usual; not till half past one. That is if—well, I thought probably you meant to go to the station to see Miss Pratt off on the one-o'clock train.”
Even so friendly an interest as this must have appeared to the quivering William an intrusion in his affairs, for he demanded, sharply: