“What say? Listen, George! Speak distinctly, if you can. I’m not deaf—just a little hard of hearing. Don’t mumble—you talk as though your mouth was full of hot potato. That’s a bad eye you’ve got—been in a fight?”
George ignored this last. “Listen—” he said, then stopped, controlling a desire to giggle as he realized his plagiarism. “Come into the library, Mr. Lewis. I’ll try to find the book for you.” He took the old man by the arm and led him down the hall.
Betty crept over to Dorothy.
“Do you know who he is?” she asked in a low tone.
“Mr. Lewis, I gathered,” said Dorothy, straining her ears to catch the muffled sounds coming from the library. “He talked loud enough,—quite an old gentleman, isn’t he?”
“Old skinflint, you mean.”
“You’ve seen him before?”
“Certainly. I’ve seen him at our house. Daddy knows him—says he’s made a fortune, foreclosing mortgages and loaning money at high rates of interest. He’s terribly rich, though you’d never know it by his looks.”
“That’s interesting—wonder what he wants with George?”
“Came to borrow a book—that’s plain enough.”