Captain Bangs broke in.
“Your brother? Kenelm?” he asked. “Why, what about Kenelm? Ain't he to home?”
“No. No, he ain't. And he ain't been home, either. I left a cold supper for him on the table, and I put the teapot on the rack of the stove ready for him to bile. But he ain't been there. It ain't been touched. I—I can't think what—”
Imogene interrupted. “Your brother's all right, Miss Parker,” she said, calmly. “He's been havin' supper with me out in the kitchen. He's there now. He's the company I said I had, Mrs. Thankful.”
Hannah stared at her. Imogene returned the gaze coolly, blandly and with a serene air of confident triumph.
“Perhaps you'd better come out and see him, ma'am,” she went on. “He—we, that is—have got somethin' to tell you. The rest can come, too, if they want to,” she added. “It's nothin' we want to keep from you.”
Hannah Parker pushed by her and rushed for the kitchen. Imogene followed her and the others followed Imogene. As Thankful said, describing her own feelings, “I couldn't have stayed behind if I wanted to. My feet had curiosity enough to go by themselves.”
Kenelm, who had been sitting by the kitchen table before a well-filled plate, had heard his sister's approach and had risen. When Mrs. Barnes and the others reached the kitchen he had backed into a corner.
“Kenelm Parker,” demanded Hannah, “what are you doin' here, this time of night?”
“I—I been eatin' supper,” stammered Kenelm, “but I—I'm through now.”