"Then you may as well acknowledge that your plan of cutting down expenses is merely a subterfuge. I know why I am dismissed, and I think you ought not to hold me responsible for my brother's rascality nor punish me for it. I regret it more than you possibly can, but I am in no way to blame for it."
"We'll not argue the matter," answered Mr. Smith, turning to his desk and picking up his pen. "All I have to say to you, is that we do not need you any longer."
"And all I have to say to you, sir, is good-day!" returned the clerk.
He took his cap from the rack behind the door, walked out of the store like one in a dream, and turned down the street. He went on by the hotel, crossed the long bridge that spanned the creek, and hurried along the road as if he were trying to leave behind him all recollection of the scene through which he had just passed.
"I can't go home yet," he kept saying to himself. "I haven't the heart to tell mother that I have lost my situation, for she has had so much trouble already that it is a wonder how she bears up under it as well as she does."
For two hours Oscar tore along the road as if he were walking a match against time, but, fast as he went, his gloomy thoughts kept pace with him. The wind came down keen and strong from the hills, stripping the withered leaves in showers from the shade-trees on either side of the road, and causing the boy's hands and face to turn to a deep purple; but he never knew it. He was so completely wrapped up in his troubles that he did not see any of the teams that passed him, nor did he hear a single one of the invitations to ride that were shouted at him by the kind-hearted farmers.
He could think of nothing but Mr. Smith's refusal to assist him in obtaining another situation, and he was only brought to his senses at last by the measured strokes of the town clock, which came faintly to his ears, followed almost immediately by the shrill whistle of the lock-shop.
Then the boy stopped, and looked about him. He was standing on the summit of one of the highest hills, and the village of Eaton could be dimly seen in the distance.
"It's twelve o'clock," said he to himself. "I had no idea it was so late. Now I'll go home. I must go some time, and I might as well go now as an hour later. Besides, mother will be uneasy if I am not there in time for dinner. Let's look this matter squarely in the face, and see what is to be done about it."