Claire and McLagan were walking down the dusty, unpaved road in the direction of the city’s main highway. Len Stern had already departed to transact his business at Victor Burns’ bank. The mother had gone back to the work that always claimed her, comforted far more than she knew by the revelation of the staunch devotion of her dead son.
Once clear of the house Claire raised her wide questioning eyes to the face of the man beside her.
“Why did you jump in while Len was talking?” she asked abruptly. “Why did you remind him that Jim was—drowned?”
McLagan’s reply came on the instant.
“Because he wasn’t drowned, and—Len knows it.”
“Murdered?”
“Sure.”
“Then why not say it? Why——”
“Say, Claire,” McLagan broke in with that roughness she knew so well, “do you think I’d brought Len along to tell your Mum that Jim was foully murdered and robbed? No. I know it. You know it. We’re young and strong, and it’s not going to hurt us, seeing poor Jim is dead anyway. But she’s his mother. Think, my dear, just think. Len and I fixed it up to say that. I jumped, scared he might blurt out the truth. Jim’s mother is some one we both love. Right deep in her heart now is the swell thought of all that boy was trying to do for her. He died doing it. To her there’s no picture of a foul murder with the murderer standing over him and robbing him. Don’t you see? Sure you do. For all her tears I guess we’ve left Jim’s mother a mighty happy woman. An’ she’ll never be told the thing that really happened.”