“Humph!” he grunted, leaning back slowly against the cushions. “So that’s it, eh?... I see.”
“I certainly hope you do see. I should hate to believe you ever really saw anything else. Honestly now, Foster Townsend, you never expected that I would drop my work and my self-respect and everything else of my own and move in here to live on your charity like—like a pauper goin’ to the poorhouse? You didn’t really expect me to do that? Come now!”
Whatever he expected, or had expected up to that time, he kept to himself. He thrust his hands into his trousers pockets and smiled.
“The same old Reliance, aren’t you,” he observed. “I told you last night that you hadn’t changed, and I was right. You’re just as contrary as ever.”
“Perhaps I am. I’m glad I’ve got spunk enough to be contrary when it is necessary. And it is necessary now.”
“Humph! Answer me this: Why do you suppose I asked you and your brother to come here if I didn’t expect you to come? If I hadn’t wanted you I shouldn’t have asked you. I usually know what I mean.”
“Yes, you do. So do I. That’s one thing we’ve got in common, anyhow. And—”
“Hold on! As for your coming here being like going to the poorhouse—well, I don’t know that I’d call this place a poorhouse, exactly. As for work, I told you I could find plenty of work for you to do, if you wanted it.”
“Yes, but you told me you’d have to find it. You didn’t say you needed me, because you know perfectly well you don’t. Foster, I used to know you pretty well and you haven’t changed any more than I have—except that you’ve grown rich, and mercy knows I am as poor as I ever was. When you used to come to see me and take me to ride and to parties and all the rest of it—a hundred years ago, or whenever it was—you always set out to have your own way. I must do the things you wanted done and not do the things you didn’t want.”
He was amused. “Maybe so,” he admitted, with a chuckle, “but I remember you generally did what you wanted to, in the end. And you’ve done it ever since, so far as I can make out.”