"Do I look hysterical, Jack?"
So the two men talked on. What they said would not have been wholly understood by Isabelle, and would not have interested her. And yet it contained more elements of pathos, of modern tragedy, than all the novels she read and the plays she went to see. The homely, heavy man—"He looks just like a bag of meal with a yellow pumpkin on top," Isabelle had said—replied to a thrust by Lane:—
"Yes, maybe I shall fail in the lumber business. It's pretty late to swap horses at forty-three. But Alice and I have talked it over, and we had rather run that risk than the other—"
"You mean?"
"That I should do what Satters of the L. P. has just testified he's been doing—under orders—to make traffic."
It was a shrewd blow. Satters was a clear case where the powerful L. P. road had been caught breaking the rate law by an ingenious device that aroused admiration in the railroad world. He had been fined a few thousand dollars, which was a cheap forfeit. This reference to Satters closed the discussion.
"I hope you will find the lumber business all you want it to suit your conscience, Steve. Come in and have some lunch!"
The heavy man refused,—he was in no mood for one of Isabelle's luncheons, and he had but one more day of vacation. Gathering up his brood, he retraced his way across the meadow, the four small boys following in his track.
"Well!" exclaimed Isabelle to her husband. "What was your business all about? Luncheon has been waiting half an hour. It was as good as a play watching you two out there. Steve looked really awake."
"He was awake all right," Lane replied.