“I don't know as I have.”
“How long can you remain here?”
“I don't know exactly.”
Sewell turned and followed the manager into the refrigerator room, where he had remained patiently whistling throughout this interview.
When he came back, Lemuel had carried one trayful of bowls upstairs, and returned for another load, which he was piling carefully up for safe transportation.
“The manager tells me,” said Sewell, “that practically you can stay here as long as you like, if you work, but he doesn't think it desirable you should remain, nor do I. But I wish to find you here again, when I come back. I have something in view for you.”
This seemed to be a question, and Lemuel said, “All right,” and went on piling up his bowls. He added, “I shouldn't want you to take a great deal of trouble.”
“Oh, it's no trouble,” groaned the minister. “Then I may depend upon seeing you here any time during the day?”
“I don't know as I'm going away,” Lemuel admitted.
“Well, then, good-bye, for the present,” said Sewell, and after speaking again to the manager, and gratefully ordering some kindling which he did not presently need, he went out, and took his way homeward. But he stopped half a block short of his own door, and rang at Miss Vane's. To his perturbed and eager spirit, it seemed nothing short of a divine mercy that she should be at home. If he had not been a man bent on repairing his wrong at any cost to others, he would hardly have taken the step he now contemplated without first advising with his wife, who, he felt sure, would have advised against it. His face did not brighten at all when Miss Vane came briskly in, with the “How d'ye do?” which he commonly found so cheering. She pulled up the blind and saw his knotted brow.