"A boy?" said the fat, red-faced man, laughing, till the round cheeks were all wrinkled up. "Well, now, I take it, you're joking, sir."
"Oh, no, I'm not," said old Mr. King very seriously, but the other man had been just as observing in his way, and had seen the twinkle in the keen eyes. So now he laughed some more and waited patiently for the joke to be explained.
"I take it you have a boy named Jack, hereabout," said Mr. King presently.
All the wrinkles dropped suddenly out of the fat, red cheeks. "He hain't done nothin' wrong, Jack hain't?" gasped the man.
"Oh, Grandpapa, tell him what we've come for," cried Joel, twitching Mr. King's hand, and quite aghast to see the suffering in Jack's father. "Do, please, Grandpapa."
Old Mr. King was rapidly exclaiming: "No, no; bless you, did you think I'd come at you in such a way? Why, this boy here"—thrusting Joel forward—"has got an invitation for him. Now, then Joel, my boy, speak up."
And Joel did speak up; and in a minute they were all there in the little shop, and the fat grocer was bustling around to work a chair out from behind the counter. But as the big store cat and several parcels were on it, it took a bit of time. Meanwhile, old Mr. King sat down upon a box of soap, while Joel hung over his shoulder.
A woman came in with a jug to be filled with molasses, and a small girl for a box of matches. But the little grocer told them to wait, and after he had placed the chair and gotten Mr. King off from the soap-box and into it, he bustled to a door at the head of the shop.
"Ma," he cried, putting his head into the room to which it opened, "do you know where Jack is?"
"He's upstairs," said a voice, evidently "Ma's."