“Hello, Mr. Corinth. I’m glad to see you. I read in a journal something about what you’ve been doing here, and when Washington tapped my superiors for some chemists I said I’d go and I suggested going here. I didn’t want to leave much, though.”
Mr. Corinth’s eyes were less opaque. “Naturally.”
“I thought I ought to. London finally cabled the State Department. They talked to the moguls. I was in a plane for Lisbon a day later. What’s on the fire?”
The old man rubbed his face with both hands and looked through his fingers.
“You could be an agent, eh? Walking in cold. You could—Jimmie, if I didn’t remember the Hallowe’en you broke the windows in my chicken coop and I caught you redhanded! You still do look impish, in a conservative way.” He laughed silently again. “I was sure proud when you won the chemistry prize in Oxford! Almost tried to hire you then. Seems a long time ago, eh? And that paper you just wrote was a peach!” He paused and said quietly, “How are they doing, Jimmie?”
The young man answered, “All right.”
“No better than that?”
“Maybe, a little. It’s not easy—on just plain people.”
“Jimmie, who isn’t—just plain people?”
The homecoming smile became a shade rueful. “Well, I guess my folks aren’t—any more. We’ve put on the dog, Mr. Corinth. About Saint Bernard size, it looks like.”