“Oh, Bibbs,” she said, shaking her head woefully, “you'd oughtn't to distress your sister! She says you drove that young man right out of the house. You'd ought to been more considerate.”
Bibbs smiled faintly, noting that Edith's door was open, with Edith's naive shadow motionless across its threshold. “Yes,” he said. “He doesn't appear to be much of a 'man's man.' He ran at just a glimpse of one.”
Edith's shadow moved; her voice came quavering: “You call yourself one?”
“No, no,” he answered. “I said, 'just a glimpse of one.' I didn't claim—” But her door slammed angrily; and he turned to his mother.
“There,” he said, sighing. “That's almost the first time in my life I ever tried to be a man of action, mother, and I succeeded perfectly in what I tried to do. As a consequence I feel like a horse-thief!”
“You hurt her feelin's,” she groaned. “You must 'a' gone at it too rough, Bibbs.”
He looked upon her wanly. “That's my trouble, mother,” he murmured. “I'm a plain, blunt fellow. I have rough ways, and I'm a rough man.”
For once she perceived some meaning in his queerness. “Hush your nonsense!” she said, good-naturedly, the astral of a troubled smile appearing. “You go to bed.”
He kissed her and obeyed.
Edith gave him a cold greeting the next morning at the breakfast-table.