in Coniston whom he thought
about was Jethro Bass. Bob decided that his liking for Jethro had not
diminished, but rather increased; he admired Jethro for the advice he
had given, although he did not mean to take it. And for the first time
he pitied him.

Bob did not know that rumor, too, was spreading in Brampton. He had his
dinner in the big walnut dining room all alone, and after it he smoked
his father's cigars and paced up and down the big hall, watching the
clock. For he could not go to her in the school hours. At length he
put on his hat and hurried out, crossing the park-like enclosure in the
middle of the street; bowed at by Mr. Dodd, who always seemed to be on
hand, and others, and nodding absently in return. Concealment was not
in Bob Worthington's nature. He reached the post-office, where the
partition door was open, and he walked right into a comparatively full
meeting of the Brampton Club. Ephraim sat in their midst, and for once
he was not telling war stories. He was silent. And the others fell
suddenly silent, too, at Bob's entrance.

"How do you do, Mr. Prescott?" he said, as Ephraim struggled to his
feet. "How is the rheumatism?"

"How be you, Mr. Worthington?" said Ephraim; "this is a kind of a
surprise, hain't it?" Ephraim was getting used to surprises. "Well, it
is good-natured of you to come in and shake hands with an old soldier."

"Don't mention it, Mr. Prescott," answered honest Bob, a little abashed,
"I should have done so anyway, but the fact is, I wanted to speak to you
a moment in private."

"Certain," said Ephraim, glancing helplessly around him, "jest come out
front." That space, where the public were supposed to be, was the
only private place in the Brampton post-office. But the members of the
Brampton Club could take a hint, and with one consent began to make
excuses. Bob knew them all from boyhood and spoke to them all. Some of
them ventured to ask him if Harvard had bust up.

"Where does Cynthia-live?" he demanded, coming straight to the point.

Ephraim stared at him for a moment in a bewildered fashion, and then a
light began to dawn on him.

"Lives with me," he answered. He was quite as ashamed, for Bob's sake,
as if he himself had asked the question, and he went on talking to cover
that embarrassment. "It's made some difference, too, sence she come.
House looks like a different place. Afore she, come I cooked with a
kit, same as I used to in the harness shop. I l'arned it i