"How do you know?"
"I know!" he cried, and stamped his foot. "I know!"
He came away from this futile interview in a suppressed rage. From the hall he saw old Aunt Cindy waddling about in the dining room. No use to appeal to her. She knew too much, anyhow, that old woman. There was in her nature none of the simple credulity that characterized his parents. She was worldly wise, like himself.
He avoided her, therefore, his face turned over his shoulder, afraid she would see and call him. He went out on the front porch, down the steps, and, gun under his arm, sauntered round the house to the kennel. Old Frank came to meet him as far as the chain would allow. Frank thought he was going to be turned loose now—his eyes showed it. There was a log of wood beside the kennel, and the boy sat down on it. Frank nestled close to him, tail dragging across the ground.
Suddenly the boy was all attention, and Frank had pricked his ears. Steve Earle had come from the pasture, gone up the back steps, and into the room with the boy's mother. Through the open window just above the kennel he could hear them talking in a confidential sort of way, as grown folks talk when they think no one is listening.
"Where's the boy?" asked Earle.
"I don't know, Steve—he went out just now."
She was silent a while, then she spoke, with a little laugh that didn't sound like a laugh:
"Steve—it's pitiful, pitiful!"
"It's drastic, Mother—but it's the best way."