And he hurried around the corner and entered the kitchen.
“What’s the matter, Phin?” he cried, bluffly. “There’s something on and you might as well out with it. It’s the Looks together against the world—and you know what the family is!”
“Enough of that, Hiram!” roared the Squire, thumping the table at which he sat deep in thought, as his brother came in. Dishes fell off and were smashed on the floor. He kicked the fragments impatiently. “The Looks are rowdies, plug-uglies and street brawlers, and we ought to be ashamed to lift our heads in the presence of decency and refinement. The trouble with you is, you’re too much of a fool to know that you’re cheap—that we’re all cheap. That’s the word—cheap!”
But Hiram’s good nature was not to be disturbed that morning.
“You’re one of the good old breed, even if you are chewed up just this minute,” he replied cheerfully. “And whatever’s goin’ on now I’m goin’ to be in it, Phin, and you can’t shake me. I’m your brother and you can’t cut me out. Now, what is it?”
It was not to be resisted, this frank and honest anxiety to be of use, and the Squire was sorely in need of counsel and aid. With a glance at the Mayo youth; who was rubbing listlessly away at a saucepan, his misty and unseeing gaze fixed on the far hills framed in the kitchen windows, the lawyer drew his brother out of the room into the yard.
“What’s the matter with your friend, Phin?” inquired the showman. “He acts like a wax figger with clock-work in him.”
The lawyer explained rapidly.
“You ain’t goin’ to stop her, be ye?” asked Hiram when he had listened.
“I’m not goin’ to let that hound break up that little family,” insisted the Squire. “Look at that poor, heart-broken boy in that kitchen and then tell me if he is to be robbed in such a fashion.”