Brian was told only that Mr. Ward was coming to visit Auntie Sue, and that he must be busy somewhere away from the house when the banker arrived, and not come until he was sent for, because Auntie Sue must make a full confession to her old pupil of the part she had played in the Re-Creation of Brian Kent before Homer T. Ward should meet his former clerk.
Brian, never dreaming that there were other confessions to be made, smilingly agreed to do exactly as he was told.
When the momentous day arrived, Betty Jo met her uncle in Thompsonville, and all the way home she talked so continuously of her school, and asked so many questions about his conduct and life and their many Chicago friends, that the helpless bank president had no chance whatever of asking her a single embarrassing question. But, when dinner was over (Brian had taken his lunch with him to the clearing), Homer T. Ward wanted to know things.
“Was Brian Kent still working in the neighborhood?”
Auntie Sue informed him that Brian was still working in the neighborhood.
“Betty Jo had seen the bank clerk?” Betty Jo's uncle supposed. “What did she think of the fellow?”
Betty Jo thought Brian Kent was a rather nice fellow.
“And how had Betty Jo been amusing herself while her old uncle was slaving in the city?”
Betty Jo had been doing a number of things: Helping Auntie Sue with her housework; learning to cook; keeping up her stenographic work; reading.
“Reading?” That reminded him, and forthwith Mr. Ward went to his room, and returned with the book.