“Sorry for what, Mr. Landor?”
“To have driven your little friends away. They evidently had some good news to tell you.”
“Oh! that’s all right,” said Jack cheerily, “it will keep, you know, and they were in a hurry—they said they could only stop a moment.” Jack was puzzling his young brain over their abrupt departure, but his loyalty to all three friends made him wish to hide from Landor the fact that he was apparently the cause. “I’m so sorry they were in a hurry,” he continued, “for I’m always wishing you knew one another—you’d get on like a house afire.”
“Should we, Jack? I don’t know. Recent events don’t seem to prove it, do they?” laughing good-naturedly.
“Oh! that doesn’t count. You just wait until some day when they have more time—I don’t know when that’ll be, though, for they’re regular hustlers. What do you suppose?” confidentially. “They call their flat ‘The Hustle’—isn’t that great?”
“I should say so—it sounds enterprising.”
“They named it after the private car they used to live in—they’ve told me all about it. Gee! wouldn’t I like to get aboard of her once! She must have been a beauty!”
“What became of the car? Did you ever happen to hear, Jack?”
“It’s out west somewhere—some railroad’s got it, I think, but I’m not sure. They never spoke of it but once—I could see it went kind of hard talking about it, though Miss Hester laughed and joked about its being they who did the hustling now, instead of the car. It must be fine to be rich and travel all around,” exclaimed the boy, “but I’d hate to have had it and then have to give it all up the way they have. Say, Mr. Landor, shall I tell you something?” He clasped the arms of the reclining chair with his thin hands and drew himself up to a sitting posture.
Landor nodded and drew his seat closer. He encouraged the boy in his confidences.