Uncle Martin here became oracular, his somber stick gesturing to point his words.
"Trouble with poor George, he's been silly enough to blurt out the truth, what every man of us thinks in his heart—"
"Eh?" said Mr. Evans quickly, as one who has been jolted.
"No more sense than to come right out and say what every one of us thinks in his secret heart about women. I think it and you think it—"
"Oh, well, if you put it that way," admitted young Mr. Evans gracefully. "But of course—"
"Certainly, of course! We all think it—sacred names of home and mother and all the rest of it; but a man running for office these days is a chump to say so, isn't he? Of course he is! What chance does it leave him? Answer me that."
"Darned little, if you ask me," said Mr. Evans judicially. "Poor old George!"
"Talks as if he were going to be married tomorrow instead of its having come off five weeks ago," pursued Uncle Martin bitterly. Plainly there were depths of understanding in the man, trimmer though he might be.
Mr. Evans made no reply. Irrationally he was considering the terms "five weeks" and "married" in relation to a spinster who would have professed to be indignant had she known it.
"Got to pull the poor devil out," said Uncle Martin, when in silence they had traversed fifty feet more of the shaded side of Maple Avenue.