Hank smiled wearily at her, and went slowly toward the house.
"How long can you stay?" she asked, running after him. "How long will you give us?"
He took out his watch, and held it close to his face. "I guess I'll take the eleven o'clock train. It's nine now—I thought I'd look up some of the boys."
"Give us all the time," she said, pleadingly, "stay with your father an' me. Oh, promise, will you?"
"All right," he said, obligingly. "I don't care if I do. I'm beat out, anyway."
"I have to go some place, but I'll be back soon," she called after him, then she threw up both hands and pressed them over her ears,—a favourite gesture with her when she was doing hard thinking.
"Mr. Waysmith or Mr. Tracy," she repeated, half aloud. "Mr. Waysmith or Mr. Tracy. Mr. Tracy," she said, at last, "he's most likely," and whirling on her heel, she flew down the path, out the gate, and into the street.
Poacher, silent, graceful, and swift, kept close to her, but the battered Gippie soon gave up the chase with a howl of protest, and went limping home.
Hank, to his surprise, had, on the whole, the most agreeable talk of his life with his father. The old man was altered. He had been, at the same time, the stiffest and the most demonstrative of parents, the young man reflected. There really was a remarkable change for the better in him, and yet, at the end of three-quarters of an hour, Hank got up to take his leave.
They were nearly always absent from each other, they had got out of the way of taking an active interest in each other's concerns—there was not yet sufficiently firm footing and enough of it to bridge to the shaky background of the past, and parting would be a mutual relief.