“Funny how the Major let up on him!” Poke ruminated. “Well, you never can tell what’ll happen. But I guess there must have been some weak spot, after all, in the case. If there wasn’t, the Major would have hung on like a bulldog.”
“Gee, but I wouldn’t have him after me—not for a farm!” quoth Step.
Sam held his peace. He might have shed fresh light upon the peculiarities of the old soldier, but the present time was not opportune. He had little share in the talk as the boys walked home together; and the mood of silence held him through dinner. Then his father proposed a stroll, and the boy accepted the invitation.
On the top of a hill overlooking the town—not only a sightly place but also one ensuring freedom from interruption—father and son had their discussion calmly and deliberately.
“Sam,” Mr. Parker began, “I’m not going to preach a sermon, but I’m going to take a text. You supplied it when you told me last night that you didn’t regard lack of direct prohibition as making a very good excuse for what you did. The trouble is, you reached that opinion after the fact. In the beginning, I dare say, it seemed quite reasonable to do the thing which wasn’t forbidden.”
“Well, sir, I—I did it,” said Sam sheepishly.
“Exactly! And, in doing it, you yielded to impulse.”
“I sup-suppose so.”
“You had no wish, no intention, to harm anybody,” Mr. Parker went on. “You desired to go hunting—I’ve felt the desire; I know what it is. Then there was my gun, fairly thrusting itself upon you—seemed that way, didn’t it?”
“You’re telling it, sir, as if you’d stood in my shoes.”