IX
On his way to The Greenbush he overtook Joel Quimber, and without warning linked his arm close in the old man's. At the sudden contact Joel started.
"Uncle Jo, old chap, how are you? This seems like home to see you round."
"Lord bless me, Champ, how you come on a feller! Here, stan' still till I get a good look at ye;—growed, growed out of all notion. Why, I hain't seen ye for good two year. You warn't to home last summer?"
"Only for a week; I was off on a yachting cruise most of the time. Mother said you were up on the Bay then at your grandniece's—pretty girl. I remember you had her down here one Christmas."
The old man made no definite answer, but cackled softly to himself: "Yachting cruise, eh? And you remember a pretty girl, eh?" He nudged him with a sharpened elbow and whispered mysteriously: "Devil of a feller, Champ! I've heerd tell, I've heerd tell—chip of the old block, eh?" He nudged him knowingly again.
"Oh, we're all devils more or less, we men, Uncle Jo; now, honor bright, aren't we?"
"You've hit it, Champ; more or less—more or less. I heerd you was a-goin' it strong: primy donny suppers an' ortermobillies—"
"Now, Uncle Jo, you know there's no use believing all you hear, but you can't plunge a country raised boy into a whirlpool like New York for four years and not expect him to strike out and swim with the rest. You've got to, Uncle Jo, or you're nobody. You'd go under."