But Catherine, after a faint smile at him, was shaking hands with his father, and the boys were growing importunate.
“Come on, Uncle Stacey!” Carter shouted. “Do ‘Fly away, Jack!’ for him! Come on! Over here!”
“Carter! Carter!” said his mother. “Not so loud! And let Uncle Stacey alone.”
“No, but he wants to play, don’t you, Uncle Stacey?” Carter insisted, moderating his voice, however.
“Sure!” said Stacey. “Only wouldn’t you—er—just as lief try some other game?”
“No. ‘Fly away, Jack!’ ” the boy returned firmly. “I do it for him sometimes, and he can’t ever find them. Only,” he added in a tremendous whisper, “they come off kind of often.”
Stacey set patiently about the game, In a way it was a relief—like knitting, he supposed. But, as he played it, he heard his father at the other end of the room proudly telling Phil and Catherine of the Omaha adventure, and an odd dream-like sensation came over Stacey of not knowing which was real—this, the childish game with the boys, or that, the story his father was repeating. Neither, perhaps.
Phil came over and stood near him. “A sad day for you that you introduced that game!” he remarked.
“Oh, I don’t know! I don’t mind it,” Stacey returned. “ ‘Come back, Jack! Come back, Jill!’ ”
(“Did I really introduce it?” he thought hazily. “Was it really I or some ancestor of mine?”)