"To commune with him? What about?"
"You."
"Why?" she asked, plainly mystified.
"I stood in need of good counsel," he answered, cheerfully, "or a friendly word, perhaps, and—as I sat there—after a while it came."
"What was it?"
"To forget that I was sodden with selfishness; to pretend not to be as full of meanness as I really was! Doesn't that seem to be Eskew's own voice?"
"Weren't you happy last night, Joe?"
"Oh, it was all right," he said, quickly. "Don't you worry."
And at this old speech of his she broke into a little laugh of which he had no comprehension.
"Mamie came to see me early this morning," she said, after they had walked on in silence for a time. "Everything is all right with her again; that is, I think it will be. Eugene is coming home. And," she added, thoughtfully, "it will be best for him to have his old place on the Tocsin again. She showed me his letter, and I liked it. I think he's been through the fire—"