The taxi-cab stopped so suddenly that Myron bit his tongue over the last word as he pitched forward. Of course Millard described much the same gymnastic feat, but it is doubtful if Millard heard, or thought he heard, what Myron did in the brief instant that his head protruded through a front window, for Eddie Moses’ neck stayed Myron’s forward flight and Eddie’s mouth was but a few inches from Myron’s ear. And in the part of a second that it remained there it got the impression that some one, presumably Eddie, had distinctly said: “Shut up!” That impression did not register on his brain, however, until he was back in his seat and Eddie had released his emergency brake. Then, while Eddie, in reply to Millard’s somewhat incensed question, was apologetically explaining something about a dog that had run almost under the wheels, he stared startledly at the back of Eddie’s head. That told him nothing, though, and he harked back to the interrupted conversation to discover what could have brought such a fiercely voiced admonition from the driver, if, indeed, that admonition had not been imagined. The shaking-up, however, had jostled memory as well as body, and it was Millard who supplied the information he sought.
“I didn’t see any dog,” he said huffily to Eddie. “Guess you imagined it. Now, then, Foster, you were explaining about that numbering.”
“What numbering?” asked Myron blankly.
“Forgotten?” laughed Millard. “Why, we were talking about signals, don’t you remember?”
“Oh, yes,” answered Myron thoughtfully. “So we were. How would it do to take the Princeville Road back, Eddie? That’ll give us more of a drive.”
As a matter of fact, it would do nothing of the sort, and Myron knew it, and Eddie Moses knew it when he added cheerfully, “All right, boss!” Only Millard didn’t know it, although it is likely that he suspected it later when, in far less time than it had taken them to reach Sturgis, they were back again in Warne. During that journey back, made at a greater speed than the trip away, Millard tried vainly to swing the conversation back to the topic of football, and football signals in particular, but Myron seemed to have suddenly wearied of the subject and wouldn’t stay put a minute. He pointed out features of the landscape for Millard’s admiring observation and invented quite a few interesting legends about passing houses or farms. After a while Millard managed to display some enthusiasm for nature and for the legends and was quite the entertaining and charming youth he had been before that shaking-up. But Myron thought that there had been a quarter of an hour subsequent to it when the visitor had sounded out of patience and even a trifle short-tempered. He might have simply imagined it, though. They were back in town long before five, and Millard’s train didn’t leave until after six, and there was plenty of time to visit the school, but Millard recalled a forgotten appointment at the hotel and was set down there accordingly. He was most apologetic and thanked Myron for a good time and begged to be allowed to go halves on the cab bill. This privilege Myron indignantly denied. Millard promised to look Myron up again shortly.
“I want to see the school and all that, you know, Foster,” he declared. “Wish I could run up there now, but I’ll be tied up until train time. The next time I come you must come down and have dinner with me.”
They shook hands and parted, Myron returning to the cab and bidding Eddie drive him to Sohmer. But out of sight of the hotel Myron leaned over and addressed the back of Eddie’s freckled neck. “Did you say anything to me the time I went through the window?” he asked.
“Yeah, I said ‘Shut up!’ You was doing a lot of fancy talking to that guy, seemed to me. ’Course, he might be a friend of yours and all, but you was telling him things about the football team that you hadn’t ought to, see? That’s why I jammed on the ’mergency. There wasn’t no dog at all!”
“Oh,” murmured Myron, “I see. Maybe you’re right. Anyway, I’m much obliged. Of course, Millard is perfectly square, but he might talk.”