"Esther," said the boy, "what do you suppose makes father so quiet and solemn lately—more than usual? Has anything happened, or is it just thinking?"
"Well," said the girl, who had a touch of the gentle tease in her, "perhaps it is just the left-over sadness from finding out that you'd been smoking!"
"Huh," murmured Dan, "you drop that, Essie! That was two weeks ago—besides, he didn't find out; I told him; and I took my medicine, too—never flinched. That's all over. More likely he remembers the fuss you made about not being let to go with the Slocums to see the theatre in Pittsburgh. You cried, baby! I didn't."
The boy rubbed the back of his hand reminiscently against the leg of his trousers, and Esther was sorry she had reminded him of a painful subject.
"Anyway," she said, "you had the best of it. I'd rather have gone, and told him about it, and taken a whipping afterward."
"What stuff! You know dad wouldn't whip a girl—not to save her life. Besides, when a thing's done, and 'fessed, and paid for, it's all over with dad. He's perfectly fair, I must say that. He doesn't nag like girls do."
"Now you drop that, Danny, and I'll tell you what I think is the matter with father. But you must promise not to speak to him about it."
"All right, I promise. What is it?"
"I guess—now mind, you mustn't tell—but I'm almost sure it is something about our Uncle Abel. A letter came last month, postmarked Colorado; and last week there was another letter in the same handwriting from Harrisburg. Father has been reading them over and over, and looking sadder each time. I guess perhaps Uncle Abel is in trouble or else——"
"You mean father's rich brother that lives out West? Billy Slocum told me about him once—says he's a king-pin out there, owns a mine a mile deep and full of gold, keeps lots of fast horses, wins races all over the country. He must be great. You mean him? Why doesn't father ever speak of him?"