Susan tried to speak; but the tears were again chasing each other down her cheeks, and her face was working with emotion.
"Susan!" The boy put out his hand gropingly, turning his head with the pitiful uncertainty of the blind. "Susan, you are there, aren't you?"
Susan caught her breath chokingly, and strode into the room with a brisk clatter.
"Here? Sure I'm here—but so dumb with amazement an' admiration that I couldn't open my head—to see you standin' there all dressed like that! What did I tell you? I knew you could do it. Now, come, let's go see dad." She was at his side now, her arm linked into his.
But the boy drew back.
"No, no, Susan, not there. He—he wouldn't like it. Truly, he—he doesn't want to see me. You know he—he doesn't like to see disagreeable things."
"'Disagreeable things,' indeed!" exploded Susan, her features working again. "Well, I guess if he calls it disagreeable to see his son dressed up an' walkin' around—"
But Keith interrupted her once more, with an even stronger protest, and Susan was forced to content herself with leading her charge out on to the broad veranda that ran across the entire front of the house. There they walked back and forth, back and forth.
She was glad, afterward, that this was all she did, for at the far end of the veranda Daniel Burton stepped out from a door, and stood for a moment watching them. But it was for only a moment. And when she begged mutely for him to come forward and speak, he shook his head fiercely, covered his eyes with his hand, and plunged back into the house.
"What was that, Susan? What was that?" demanded the boy.