“Yes, I think I should,” Walton responded, slowly, as he thrust the envelope back into his pocket. “Yes, Dick, I'd like to hear what you think of her.”
“She is so sweet and gentle looking—so good—so very, very pretty! Oh, Fred, I understand now how you feel! I don't think I ever saw a face that I liked better. It may be because she is your—”
“Was!” Walton broke in. “Don't forget that, Dick.”
“I think a girl like that, with a face like that, would forgive almost anything in the man she loved,” the boy went on, in a valiant effort at consolation.
“If she still loved him, perhaps; but she could no longer love him,” Walton sighed. “She belongs to a proud family, Dick, not one member of which was ever guilty of such conduct as mine. She would shudder at the sight of me, she would blush with shame for having cared for me. That's why I came away. If I had not loved her, I'd have stayed and faced my punishment.” After this talk the two trudged on through the garish sunshine without exchanging a word for several miles. It was noon. They had come to the gate of a farmhouse which bore the look of prosperity, and they paused in the shade of a tree.
“We can't go farther without eating,” the boy said. “You don't like to beg, but I don't care; I've done it hundreds of times, and don't feel ashamed of it. I'm going to put on a bold front and tackle the kitchen in the rear.”
“Don't ask for anything for me,” Walton said. “I'm not very hungry. I can get along for some time yet.”
“Wait till I find out how it smells around that kitchen,”
Dick laughed. “I'm nearly dead.” The boy had opened the gate, and was walking briskly toward the house, which stood back about a hundred yards from the road. Walton saw him meet a great lazy-looking dog near the steps and pat the animal on the head. Then the dog and boy went round the building toward the kitchen. A moment later Walton saw Dick returning, a flush on his face and empty handed. The dog paused near the front steps, wagging a cordial if not, indeed, a regretful tail.
“The dirty red-faced scamp ordered me to move on!” Dick cried, angrily. “He says the country is overrun with tramps, who won't work and who expect to live on the toil of honest men.”