lukewarm soup in stone-china bowls, the tasteless profusion of canned vegetables, the dubious-looking water, and the muddy mixture, bitter from long boiling, which the Raegan House called coffee, were only additional affronts to a man already at the limit of his endurance.
His announcement of his intention to spend the rest of the day in the car, and to make it his headquarters during his stay, was delivered with a decision which left no possibility for protest.
What was mere dynamite to such indignities as these!
He stepped into the landau, which Richards had ordered round again, with a sensation of relief, heightened by that gentleman’s statement that he shouldn’t be able to see them again until morning. Richards found Mr. Wade rather exhausting, on his side.
“If you see a fellow in freak clothes on your way back, you can know it’s that son of Carrington’s,” he observed, as he stood on the sidewalk.
Hastings had his foot on the step of the landau, but he wheeled.
“Is Ned Carrington here?” he demanded.
“Been here all summer. Father broke his leg in a runaway and sent for him,” Richards growled.
“Then I think I’ll walk over and see him,” Hastings said promptly, “if you’ll excuse me, sir.”
He smiled confidently at his uncle.
“You shan’t go near him,” said Richards, fiercely, “with that shark of a father of his trying to swindle us every way he can.”
“Whatever his father is, Ned Carrington is a gentleman and my friend,” said Hastings, quietly.
“Tell him he can’t go,” Richards demanded of Mr. Wade. And his insistence was fatal. Mr. Wade would not have influenced his nephew at Richards’ dictation just now if Hastings had announced his intention of going to perdition.
Moreover, he trusted Hastings. And – this is an awful anti-climax – he wanted a nap.
“I hope you will find your friend home, Laurence,” he said, suavely. “Business quarrels can safely be ignored between gentlemen.”
Richards, watching the erect old figure disappearing in the landau toward the station, and the athletic young one striding off in the direction of the Star mine, hated them with an equal intensity.
John Carrington, dozing away on the great wicker divan on his broad veranda, in the warmth of a September afternoon, opened his eyes at the click of the gate.
The young man coming rapidly up the graveled walk was a stranger.
“Mr. Carrington?” he said, pleasantly.
“Yes, sir,” Carrington replied.
“Your son and I were friends in Paris, Mr. Carrington,” he went on. “My name is Hastings. I hope he is at home.”
Hastings! Paris! This was the young fellow whom Sarah had written about – who was so attentive to Elenore.
Carrington looked at him critically, and was pleased.
“Sit down, Mr. Hastings,” he said, cordially. “Ned just went in to order the horses for a little later. He will be out presently, and will be glad to see you.”
“I was surprised to hear that Ned was here, Mr. Carrington,” Hastings went on, seating himself. “He was to start for the East with Velantour the day I left Paris, and I supposed he was painting away for dear life somewhere in the Vale of Cashmere.”
“I didn’t even know he intended to go,” said Carrington, quietly.
“What!” said Hastings. “He hasn’t told you that Velantour asked him to go? It was the greatest opportunity he could ever have!” Then he thought. “Of course your illness was first with him,” he said. “I hope I haven’t been telling tales out of school.” He smiled frankly. Then “He’s a genius, though.” The praise burst out spontaneously. “They expect great things of him in Paris, Mr. Carrington.”
John Carrington did some rapid thinking. So the boy had put aside the biggest opportunity in his life to come back to him. Put it aside cheerfully. To gratify – John Carrington was hard on himself now – his father’s selfish pride. The need had not been imperative. He could have written him all the questions it was advisable to ask him. But he had been in pain, and harassed, and he had sacrificed the boy to it. Well, he should go back soon. He, John Carrington, was not so near senility that he couldn’t manage his own affairs. His jaw set squarely.
“I’m glad you told me, Mr. Hastings,” he said, calmly. Quick steps were coming through the hall. “Before he had a chance to head you off,” he concluded, smilingly. The eyes he turned toward the door were very proud. “Here’s a friend you’ll be glad to see,” he said, cheerily. Yet it seemed to him, and to Hastings, that the lad’s first impulse was toward recoil.
He certainly paled a little. And Hastings said to himself that Ned had, in some subtle way, changed indefinably, but certainly. His eyes did not carry out the comfortable familiarity of his attire. It appeared to Hastings that they were making some demand upon him – a demand that he could not understand.
But the next second young Carrington came forward with at least a surface cordiality.
“How did you find me out – Hastings?” he said, with a slight hesitation before the name, as perplexing as the characteristic grasp of his hand, familiar and unfamiliar at once, and the tinge of formality that obtruded itself unmistakably.
“I had no idea you were here until I heard it just now from Richards,” said Hastings, struggling with a vague sense of rebuff.
The name might have been the Medusa head.
Then “Richards?” John Carrington queried. Hastings flushed.
“My uncle, Mr. Wade, has given me the Tray-Spot mine,” he said, and his voice became formal in turn. “We lunched with our manager to-day.”
In spite of his annoyance, his lips twitched at the memory of it.
“It seems that there is war between the two mines, Mr. Carrington;” he turned to the older man. “I don’t know anything of mining, but there must be some way out of it which would be just both to your interests and to ours.”
For John Carrington had impressed him indelibly as an honest man.
Hastings’ tone was both dignified and frank. John Carrington liked it. But could good come out of anything connected with the Tray-Spot? It had always been a thorn in the flesh.
Ned had crossed the veranda quickly, to seat himself behind a book-laden table. Once so ensconced, he drew a long breath of relief. Then he began to look amused.
“We have suggested a way, but it did not meet with your uncle’s approval,” said John Carrington, quietly.
“I quite agree with my uncle that we do not care to sell,” said Hastings, calmly.
“Nor, I assume, do you care to discharge your manager,” John Carrington went on.
“No,” said Hastings, frankly again; “my uncle has always considered Richards an invaluable man.”
“He
