“Oh, no; not on your life! After jumping me for buying them? My dear Tom Walsh, there are moments when the worm will turn!”
This was the first occasion on which Wayne had ever spoken of his father to Walsh except in terms of respect, and Walsh was perfectly aware of it.
“If I were you I’d turn those shares over to the Colonel.”
“If it’s anything to you—if you’re going to be criticized for failing to get them, I’ll give them to him—or I’ll sell them to you.”
“No, you don’t have to worry about me, my boy; I can take care of myself, but I don’t want you to feel that way toward your father. It ain’t healthy; it ain’t right.”
“Please don’t do that, Tom. My head aches, and you’re too good a fellow to preach. I didn’t know those shares were so valuable; it was just a piece of fool luck that I got them. I suppose they thought letting me have them was the same as passing them over to father.”
“That’s the way it ought to be.”
“But, dear old Tom,” and he laid his hand on Walsh’s thick knee, “dear old Tom, it isn’t, it isn’t, it ain’t!”
CHAPTER V
A CHILD OF THE IRON CITY
WAYNE and his father met the next morning at breakfast, a function at which, when Wayne appeared, the senior Craighill discussed the day’s news in his large way as a student of affairs. This morning he had brought the newspapers to the table and they were piled by his plate.