Somewhat uncertainly, Mr. Burke arose and approached the vision, which, standing at the threshold of his sanctum, thereupon addressed him in hurried but reassuring human tones.
"I've had a blow-out," the lady briefly announced. "Will you put on a 'spare,' please, and take a look at the other shoes?"
This service, she estimated, would take half an hour of the proprietor's time, if he moved with the customary deliberation of his class, and would, of course, make superfluous any explanation of her wait in the garage, and of her nervousness, if he happened to be sufficiently observant to notice that.
It was really fortunate that the blow-out had occurred. Surely within the half-hour Laurie would have rejoined her. If he did not, she frankly conceded to herself, she would go mad with suspense. There was a limit to what she could endure, and that limit had been reached. Thirty minutes more of patience and courage and seeming calm covered the last draft she could make on a nervous system already greatly overtaxed.
Burke drew his worn office chair close to the red-hot stove, and was mildly pained by the lady's failure to avail herself of the comfort thus offered. Instead, she threw off her big coat, and, drawing the chair to the corner farthest from the stove, seated herself there and with hands that shook took up the local newspaper which was the live wire between Burke and the outer world. Her intense desire for solitude was apparent even to his dull eye.
Burke sighed. In his humble way he was a gallant man, and it would have been pleasant to exchange a few remarks with this visitor from another sphere. Undoubtedly they would have found interests in common. This, it will be remembered, was January, 1917, three months before America's entry into the world war, and women able to drive motors were comparatively rare. Any girl who could drive a car in a storm like this, and through the drifts of country roads—Mr. Burke, having reluctantly removed himself from the lady's presence, was now beside her car, and at this point in his reflections he uttered an exclamation and his jaw dropped.
"It's the lad's car!" he ejaculated slowly, and for a moment stood staring at it. Then, still slowly, he nodded.
It was the lad's car, which, only a short time before, he himself had put in perfect order for a swift run to New York. Now this girl had it, but 'twas easy to see why. He had been wrong in his college-prank theory. Here was something more serious and much more interesting. Here was a love-affair. And, he handsomely conceded, it was going on between a pair of mates the like of which wasn't often seen. In her way the girl was as fine a looker as the boy, and that, Mr. Burke decided, was "going some, for them both."
As his meditations continued he was cursorily glancing at the tires, looking for the one that had sustained the blow-out. He was not greatly surprised to find every tire perfect. There had been plenty of mysteries in the lad's conduct, and this was merely another trifle to add to the list. Undoubtedly the lady had her reasons for insisting on a blow-out, and if she had, it was no affair of his. Also, the price for changing that tire would be a dollar, and Mr. Burke was always willing to pick up a dollar.
Whistling softly but sweetly, he removed a rear shoe, replaced it with one of the "spares" on the car's rack, and solemnly retested the others. The task, as Doris had expected, took him almost half an hour. When it was completed he lounged back to the lady and assured her that the car was again ready for service.