“Yes-sir,” replied Peabody. “I know how it is that away. I want to be by myself, often. Shall I make up the bed in the east room or the west room? Seems to me the west room is a little pleasanter.”
Allison went into the office, and closed the door after him. It was damp and chill in there, but he did not notice it. He sat down in the swivel chair behind the flat top desk, and rested his chin in his hands, and stared out of the window at the bleak and dreary landscape. Just within his range of vision was a lonely little creek, shadowed by a mournful drooping willow which had given the Club its name, and in the wintry breeze it waved its long tendrils against the leaden grey sky. Allison fixed his eyes on that oddly beckoning tree, and strove to think. Old Peabody came pottering in, and with many a clang and clatter builded a fire in the capacious Dutch stove; with a longing glance at Allison, for he was starved with the hunger of talk, he went out again.
At dusk he once more opened the door. Allison had not moved. He still sat with his chin in his hands, looking out at that weirdly waving willow. Old Peabody thought that he must be asleep, until he tiptoed up at the side. Allison’s grey eyes, unblinking, were staring straight ahead, with no expression in them. It was as if they had turned to glass.
“Excuse me, Mr. Allison. Chicken or steak? I got ’em both, one for supper and one for breakfast.”
Allison turned slowly, part way towards Peabody; not entirely.
“Chicken or steak?” repeated Peabody.
“Eh? Yes. Oh yes. Yes. The chicken.”
The fire had gone out. Peabody rebuilt it. He came in an hour later, and studied the silent man at the desk for a long minute, and then he decided an important question for himself. He brought in Allison’s dinner on a tray, and set it on a corner of the desk.
“Shall I spread a cloth?”
“No,” returned Allison. The clatter had aroused him for the moment, and Peabody went away with a very just complaint that if he had to be bothered with a visitor on a grey day like this, he’d rather not have such an unsociable cuss.