“I think you are sometime honest, sometime not; like I am myself,” replied the girl.
The old man rose and led the way back to the path.
“To be always honest is to be sometime foolish,” he muttered on the way. “Tell Meest Weld I will be there, like he say, at nine o’clock.”
[CHAPTER XX—MR. RUNYON’S DISCOVERY]
Sing Fing excelled himself at the dinner that evening, which was a merry meal because all dangers and worries seemed to belong to the past. Also it was, as Uncle John feelingly remarked, “the first square meal they had enjoyed since the one at Castro’s restaurant.” Of course Runyon stayed, because he was to help search the wall the next day, and as the telephone had been repaired Louise called up Rudolph and Helen Hahn and begged them to drive over and help them celebrate at the festive board.
So the Hahns came—although they returned home again in the late evening—and it was really a joyous and happy occasion. Inez brought in the baby, which crowed jubilantly and submitted to so many kisses that Patsy declared she was afraid they would wear the skin off Toodlum’s chubby cheeks unless they desisted.
Mildred had gone to her room immediately after her confession in the court and Louise had respected her desire for privacy and had ordered her dinner sent in to her.
As they all sat in the library, after dining, in a cosy circle around the grate fire, they conversed seriously on Mildred Leighton and canvassed her past history and future prospects.
“I cannot see,” said Beth, always the nurse’s champion, “that we are called upon to condemn poor Mildred because her father was a criminal.”
“Of course not,” agreed Patsy, “the poor child wasn’t to blame.”