"How could I be, with you yelling out of your window to John at the top of your lungs?" Jane turned on her side as she answered. "Then it was wow-wow-wow! in your room after he came up. Oh, I'm sick, sick, sick! You let that sneaking Kelly mix those last drinks on me. I heard you snickering when he did it."
"Never mind; it will go off," Mrs. Trott said, and she sat down on the edge of the bed. "It always does. Listen to me, Jane. Something has happened to John."
"Happened? What do you mean?" Jane softly moaned and gagged, her hand at her thin throat.
"Why, I don't know! That's what I want to see you about. Somebody must have been meddling—talking to him. He has a queer look in the eyes. He fairly glared at me and spoke to me— Well, he never did the like before. I was—was actually afraid of him. It looked to me once as if he was going to pounce on me. Do you remember how Judge Manis talked to us the day he remitted our fine, dismissed the court, and talked to us in private?"
"My God! woman," Jane groaned, desperately, "what are you—"
"John looked and talked like the judge did," Mrs. Trott ran on, with a little impatient wave of her hand. "I was glad he went to his room. There is no telling what he would have said about us both. Somebody has been meddling, I tell you, putting notions in the boy's head. Oh, he has changed—changed!"
"Spoiled, by that new job, I reckon," Jane Holder whined. "The new outfit Sam Cavanaugh gave him has stuck him up. Boys turn like that all of a sudden when they reach the gosling stage. He has been dreamy all his life, and he is getting his eyes open and thinks he is the whole show. You will have to put up with it, that's all."
"I don't know what to make of it— I don't, I don't!" Mrs. Trott stood up, sighed heavily, yawned, and left the room. Outside she met Dora coming from John's room.
"I asked him what he wanted for dinner," the child remarked, "but he said he wasn't going to eat here. He's going down to the restaurant—said he didn't want me to cook and drudge for him. He is funny, Mrs. Trott. He is not one bit like he used to be."
"I don't care where he eats," Mrs. Trott answered, wearily. "We haven't much in the safe, anyway. Is the flour all gone?"