"He never spoke of it. I don't believe it was on his mind. You see, he was only ten years old at the time, and though it must, of course, have been a great shock, he was really nothing but a child, and a child soon forgets. Senator Benbow's death killed his wife, but I don't think Gene realizes that. Mr. Ellison took Eugene to live with him and put Jean into a good boarding-school, and they both have been happy enough. Eugene has grown up just like other boys, except that he has been more alone. I have made a point of having him over here a good deal, just because he was growing up with no women about, over at Mr. Ellison's. Of course his sister has been here a good deal, holidays and so on, but that's different."
"Did he go anywhere else, so far as you know?"
"I know that he did not. He is too shy and reserved to care much for society. He loves to read and dream, and aside from his college mates, I don't believe that he has any friends that you could call intimate. In fact, I can't flatter myself that he really cared to come over here to see me, except when Katherine Thurston was here visiting me."
"He had the good taste then to admire Miss Thurston?"
Mr. Whyte chuckled across the gloom. "He has been her devoted slave for a year past."
"Now, Carroll," Mrs. Whyte began in protest, but before she could give it further expression we were interrupted by an approaching visitor. Clyde came swinging up the walk with an eager stride.
"Good evening!" he called cheerily, lifting his hat. "What a perfect evening it is! I don't wonder you are all out of doors. Evening, Hilton." His vigorous, even happy, manner, was most alien to our mood. It struck us like laughter at a funeral.
"We were just speaking of poor Gene Benbow," said Mrs. Whyte, with delicate reproof in her voice.
"Oh, yes, of course. He was a friend of yours, wasn't he?" he said, toning his manner down to a different key from that in which he had come.
"Was and is," said Whyte simply.