Some proud worshiper brought Mr. Flint his hat, knapsack, and net, and the mountainous Katya insisted upon tenderly placing his glasses upon his nose—upside down. Westmoreland used to say afterward that for a moment he feared Flint was going to bite her hand! Then man and dog were placed in the doctor's car and hurried home to my mother; who made no comment, but put both in the larger Guest Room, the whimpering dog on a comfort at the foot of his master's bed. Kerry had a broken rib, but outside of this he was not injured. He would be out and all right again in a week, Westmoreland assured his anxious master.
"Oh, you man, you!" crowed Westmoreland. "John, John, if anything were needed to make me love you, this would clinch it! Prying open nature's fist, John, having butterflies bear your name, working hand in glove with your government, boosting boys, writing books, are all of them fine big grand things. But if along with them one's man enough to stand up, John, with the odds against him, and punish a bully and a scoundrel, the only way a bully and a scoundrel can feel punishment, that's a heart-stirring thing, John! It gets to the core of my heart. It isn't so much the fight itself, it's being able to take care of oneself and others when one has to. Yes, yes, yes. A fight like that is worth a million dollars to the man who wins it!"
Westmoreland may be president of the Peace League, and tell us that force is all wrong. Nevertheless, his great-grandmother was born in Tipperary.
We kept the Butterfly Man indoors for a week, while Westmoreland doctored a viciously black eye and sewed up his lip. Morning and afternoon Appleboro called, and left tribute of fruit and flowers.
"Gad, suh, he behaved like one of Stonewall Jackson's men!" said Major Cartwright, pridefully. "No yellow in him; he's one of us!"
At nights came the Polish folks, and these people whom he had once despised because they "hadn't got sense enough to talk American," he now received with a complete and friendly understanding.
"I just come by and see how you make to feel, Meester."
"Oh, I feel fine, Joe, thank you."
There would be an interval of absolute silence, which, did not seem to embarrass either visited or visitor. Then:
"Baby better now?" Meester would ask, interestedly.