“Of course it’s none of my business,” he conceded.
“I didn’t mean that. But, naturally, I could have no idea of coal or oil—”
“Well; I won’t work for you at any four dollars a day,” he said loudly. “I thought I’d like to tell you.”
“I don’t want you to,” she said. “Didn’t Deacon Whittle give you my message?”
He got hurriedly to his feet with a muttered exclamation.
“Please sit down, Mr. Dodge,” she bade him tranquilly. “I’ve been wanting to see you all day. But there are so few telephones in Brookville it is difficult to get word to people.”
He eyed her with stubborn resentment.
“What I meant to say was that four dollars a day is too much! Don’t you know anything about the value of money, Miss Orr? Somebody ought to have common honesty enough to inform you that there are plenty of men in Brookville who would be thankful to work for two dollars a day. I would, for one; and I won’t take a cent more.”
She was frowning a little over these statements. The stalwart young man in shabby clothes who sat facing her under the light of Mrs. Solomon Black’s well-trimmed lamp appeared to puzzle her.
“But why shouldn’t you want to earn all you can?” she propounded at last. “Isn’t there anything you need to use money for?”