His astonishment can better be imagined than described when, returning a couple of hours later, the first thing which greeted his eyes as he pushed open the station door was the familiar form of the little pest he fancied he was rid of for good, sitting complacently on one of the benches.
Joblots smiled quite happily into the frowning countenance of the Yale man.
“Tho glad you’re back,” he lisped. “Motht annoying thing! I actually mithed the beathtly train. I went acroth the stweet to thee if I couldn’t find thome thigaretth, and while I wath talking to the man—motht amuthing perthon, he wath—the bally thing came in and I never thaw it.”
“I never heard of such a fool trick!” snapped McCormick. “Now you’ve got to wait till after one.”
“Yeth,” Percy sighed, “and not a thingle plathe to get a bite to eat.”
“Well, that’s your fault,” Archie said callously. “You’ll have to go without.”
Walking over to the window, he found that the answer to his message had not yet arrived. Consequently he had to put in another half hour in listening to Percy’s idiotic prattle before the agent called to him that the telegram had come.
McCormick sprang up eagerly and snatched the yellow sheet from the man’s hand. His eyes eagerly scanned the contents of the rather long communication and, when he had read it all, they lighted up joyfully.
“I was right,” he muttered under his breath. “I knew it must be so. Now if I can only work it right. Gee! I can hardly wait to get back to the house.”
He hurried to the door, calling a brief good-by to Percy as he passed that amazed person, leaped into the buggy outside, and a moment later the clatter of the flying horse’s hoofs died away down the village street.