Helen flushed and dropped her glance to her lap, then she rose from the piano and the two girls moved hand in hand to the window. “The truth is,” Helen admitted, “that I have been wondering if anything has gone wrong with him—any bad news or indications about his election.”
“He can't be worrying about the election,” Ida said, confidently. “Mr. Garner comes to see me often and confides in me rather freely, and he says the people are flocking back to Carson in swarms and droves. They understand him now and admire him for the courageous stand he took.”
“Well, something is wrong with him,” Helen declared, eying her cousin sadly. “Mam' Linda never makes a mistake; she knows him through and through. She went to thank him last night for getting a position for Pete to work regularly at the flouring mill, and she came back really depressed and shaking her head.
“'Suppin certain sho gone wrong wid young mars-ter, honey,' she said. 'He ain't never been lak dis before; he ain't hisse'f, I tell you! He's yaller an' shaky an' look quar out'n de eyes.'”
“Oh!” and Miss Tarpley sank into one of the chairs in the window. “I'm almost sorry you mentioned that, for now I'll worry. I've always had his cause at heart, and now—Helen, I'm afraid something very, very serious is hanging over him.
I'm not hinting at anything that might come out of his disappointment over your affair with Mr. Sanders, either. It seems to me he accepted that as inevitable and is making the best of it, but it is something else.”
“Something else!” Helen repeated. “Oh, Ida, how horribly you talk! Do you mean—is it possible that he was more seriously wounded that night than he has let us know?”