“Well,” answered Tom in a business-like manner, “it’s true or I shouldn’t be here to-day. I’ve come to ask your advice about—well, about things in general.”
Mrs. Rutherford uttered a little cry of delighted curiosity and surprise.
“Gracious!” she exclaimed, “I never heard such a thing! Mother!” turning her head to call to someone in the room beyond, “it’s all true about the baby. Do come and hear Mr. De Willoughby tell about it.”
She sat down on the steps of the porch laughing and yet regarding Tom with a half sympathetic, half curious look. It was not the first time she had found him unexpectedly mysterious.
“Where’s the father?” she said. “Didn’t he care for the poor little thing at all? The Judge heard that he was so poor that he couldn’t take care of it. Hadn’t he any friends? It has a kind of heartless sound to me—his going away that way.”
“He was poor,” said Tom, quietly. “And he had no relatives who could take the child. He didn’t know what to do with it. I—I think he had a chance of making a living out West and—the blow seemed to have stunned him.”
“And you took the baby?” put in Mrs. Rutherford.
“Yes,” Tom answered, “I took the baby.”
“Is it a pretty baby?”
“Yes,” said Tom, “I think it is.”