Fred, having gone for a shower and change of raiment, was late to the supper that Phil spread in the dining-room of the Montgomery farmhouse. He seemed unusually grave when they met at the table, and Phil surmised that Whittlesey had discussed Charles's plight with him fully. Amzi had spent an enjoyable afternoon cruising in the neighborhood among his farmer friends, and was in the best of humor. Lois, who had taken her ease, reading and napping, declared that she must cultivate a closer acquaintance with farm life. She pronounced it immensely interesting, feigning to ignore the ironical glances exchanged by Phil and Amzi. She exclaimed in a mockery of rapture over a bowl of scentless wild violets which Phil had gathered. They were amazingly fragrant, she said, waving her hand lately splashed with toilet water.
"The fraud! She hasn't been out of the house," Phil remarked to Amzi.
"Why should I go out and walk over the clods in my best slippers? I don't return to Nature; Nature returns to me. It's much pleasanter that way." She nibbled a sandwich, elbows on table, and asked if Montgomery still indulged itself in picnics, a form of recreation which she associated only with a youthful horror of chigres.
"Met Jack Whittlesey again, on my way back," said Amzi. "What's he hanging round here for?"
Fred looked up suddenly, the color deepening in his face.
"Jack's always looking for somebody," said Phil lamely, seeking to turn the talk. "He must dream that he's looking for people. I shouldn't like his job."
"He's looking for Charlie," said Fred, raising his head squarely and speaking directly across the table to Amzi. "Jack thinks he's hiding about here somewhere."
Amzi blew out his cheeks to hide his embarrassment. It was not his way to cause pain, and there was a hurt, unhappy look in Fred's eyes. And Amzi liked Fred—liked his simplicity and earnestness, and stubborn pluck, his manly attitude in adversity.
"How absurd," murmured Lois, regarding critically one of Phil's deviled eggs, made, by the way, after Rose Bartlett's recipe.
"I thought that was all a bluff about dragging Charlie into the traction business," remarked Amzi, who had not thought anything of the kind.