Covell said he was delighted. “First rate,” he exclaimed. “Just what you ought to do. The old Quarter is the place to find out what is what.”
Bob remembered something he had heard.
“Seems to me,” he began. “Why, yes, didn’t I hear that you went over there yourself, Covell? Some one told me you had studied in Paris.”
Again Covell favored the trio with that pleasant laugh of his.
“Oh, yes!” he admitted, “I was there for awhile. Plugging along pretty well for me, too, and enjoying it. But the old health machine lost a cog or something and the doctors sent me home again. The toughest break of luck I ever had, that was,” he added, with a shrug. “Well, maybe I shall have another chance by and by. I hope so.”
Townsend grunted in sympathy and Esther said she was sure he would have that chance.
“We are all so glad Bob is to have his,” she added.
Foster Townsend rose to his feet. “Well, come on, Seymour,” he ordered. “Let’s you and I go out and see Varunas for a spell. I want you to go around the Circle with me behind Claribel to-morrow. You haven’t seen her do a mile yet and it is high time you did. The mare is growing older, like the rest of us, but she can make some of the trotters around here carry all the sail they can spread and fall astern—even now.”
They left the room together, Covell pausing to shake Bob’s hand once more and express his pleasure at their reunion. Left alone—something Griffin had become to believe was not likely to happen that evening—he and Esther faced each other. His expression was somber enough. She, too, seemed a little uneasy.
“Isn’t it nice that Uncle Foster has some one with him at last who will take an interest in his trotting horses,” she said. “I used to pretend to, but he soon found out it was only make-believe. Seymour really does like horses; any one can see that he does.”