“Not one word.”
“I know there is no need to caution you.”
“Thank you.”
“I must think this over for a day or two—I must think what is best to be done. Go back to town and have everything go on as if nothing had happened. Go back on the next train. And, Grant, you’d best leave the house at once. Hugh is staying here with me, too. I don’t want him to know you’ve been here.”
“Very good, Mr. Bransby,” Grant said, picking up his hat, and turning to the ledger.
But Bransby stayed him. “I’ll keep the ledger here with me. I shall want to look over it again.”
Grant took the memorandum slip from the pocket to which he had restored it when Bransby shut the book, and held it towards his employer in silence. In silence Bransby took it.
“I am—er—I am very sorry, sir,” Grant faltered, half afraid to voice the sympathy that would not be stifled.
“Yes, yes, Grant, I know,” Richard Bransby returned gently. They looked in each other’s eyes, two old men stricken by a common trouble, a common disappointment, and for the moment, as they had not been before, in a mutual sympathy. “You shall hear from me in a day or two.”
“Very good, sir.”