“I am very sorry if it annoys or inconveniences you, Miss Strong, but since the settlement of the estate takes place to-morrow, our orders are to pay out no funds in any way connected with the estate until after that settlement has been arranged.”
“But this is my money, my own private affair,” begged Eileen. “The estate has nothing to do with it.”
“I am sorry,” repeated the teller. “If that is the case, you will have no difficulty in establishing the fact in a few minutes’ time.”
Eileen turned and left the bank, and it seemed that she was almost swaying. Linda stood a second with narrowed eyes, in deep thought.
“I think,” she said at last, deep down in her heart, “that it looks precious much as if there had been a bit of transgression in this affair. It looks, too, as if ‘the way of the transgressor’ were a darned hard way. Straight ahead, open and aboveboard for you, my girl!”
Then she went quietly to the desk and transacted her own business; but her beautiful day was clouded. Her heart was no longer leaping exultantly. She was sickened and sorrowful over the evident nerve strain and discomfort which Eileen seemed to have brought upon herself. She dreaded meeting her at dinner that night, and she wondered all the way home where Eileen had gone from the bank and what she had been doing. What she felt was a pale affair compared with what she would have felt if she could have seen Eileen leave the bank and enter a near-by store, go to a telephone booth and put in a long-distance call for San Francisco. Her eyes were brilliant, her cheeks by nature redder than the rouge she had used upon them. She squared her shoulders, lifted her head, as if she irrevocably had made a decision and would not be thwarted in acting upon it. While she waited she straightened her hat, and tucked up her pretty hair, once more evincing concern about her appearance. After a nervous wait she secured her party.
“Am I speaking with Mr. James Heitman?” she asked.
“Yes,” came the answer.
“Well, Uncle Jim, this is Eileen.”
“Why, hello, girlie,” was the quick response. “Delighted that you’re calling your ancient uncle. Haven’t changed the decision in the last letter I had from you, have you?”