"You are sure you don't mind my going," said Pearl, "without notice?"
"Not a bit—and we'll be glad to have you back, say for the Fall term. I'll fix the salary too and make out your cheque for the full month. It wouldn't be right for us to stand in your way—of course you may not want to come back—but if you do just drop me a line. I suppose you will want to go home before you go into the city. I can take you over this afternoon in the car."
"Thank you, Mr. Cowan," Pearl said, "you are very kind. I'll be ready at one o'clock. But tell me—how did you know I had an invitation to the city? That was pretty clever of you."
Mr. Cowan was untwisting the lines from the plow handles preparatory to making another round. He suddenly remembered to be discreet, and winked one eye with indescribable slyness.
"A little bird whispered to me," he laughed.
At noon, when he told Mrs. Cowan about it, he said it was queer how that answer of his seemed to hit the teacher. She went away laughing, and he could hear her for fully a quarter of a mile kind of chuckling to herself.
CHAPTER XXII
THE PLAY
"Sorry, sir," said the man in the box-office of the Grand, "but the house has been sold out for two days now. The standing room has gone too."
"Can you tell me what this is all about, that every one is so crazy to see it?" the man at the wicket asked, with studied carelessness. He was a thick-set man, with dark glasses, and wore a battered hat, and a much bedraggled waterproof.