“As a brother I advised him as best I could,” he answered. “But when—when did he see you?”
“He came over this morning—against the doctor’s advice,” put in Aunt Philomela.
“Well,” concluded Barnes, a bit inanely, “I must be going.”
Upon the words he started for the door.
“You still think that it—it is best for you to leave father?”
“I’m quite sure of that now,” he answered.
Barnes was not one to put off acting upon a resolution. He went down the hall at once, and finding Mr. Van Patten awake put the matter to him as gently as possible.
“Father,” he said, “I must go away for a little while—perhaps for a week or two.”
“Away?” gasped the old man. “Again?”
There was genuine emotion in the old man’s cry. It was a father’s cry and it created in Barnes an overwhelming desire for his own. In something of a vision he seemed to see the old proprietor of the Acme echoing this need for his son. The little comedy had turned serious. From acting the prodigal he found himself feeling the prodigal. He wanted to get back home—not as represented by the Waldemere, but as embodied in the flesh and blood of those whose name he bore. So it happened that the more this aged gentleman upon the bed expressed the need for a son, the more he stirred in Barnes the need of a father. Barnes turned away his head from the searching blind eyes.