"Yours is the sapience of the serpent! But what could he do if he did know the truth? We're both of age."

"Just the same, it's a good generalship to avoid risks. I have learned to leave little to chance."

"Aunt Ocky, will you come and live with us when we are really settled?

I've an idea I could profit a lot if I sat at your knees for a while!"

"I wish I could accept your invitation," Miss Ocky answered gravely.

Her eyes left his face and seemed to shield her thoughts behind a film of blankness. "I'm afraid I have other--plans," she added quietly.

"It's after nine--don't get the habit of unpunctuality."

He knocked on the study door at the end of the room, and closed it after him when he had entered in response to a gruff command.

For some little time Miss Ocky tried to center her thoughts on her book, lifting her head to listen now and again as she paused in her reading to cut pages with her two-edged souvenir of Teheran. The conversation in the study appeared to be flowing along smoothly. She could not catch any words, nor did she try to; a shrewd listener can glean a good deal merely by interpreting the vocal tones of the different speakers. Her ear told her that Simon was certainly laying down the law but with no more than his usual acidity, and that his son was pleading his cause patiently and without acrimony. It was natural enough that he should hope up to the eleventh hour for a favorable change in his father's att.i.tude, a foolish hope but a pardonable one--

Abruptly, Miss Ocky's ear c.o.c.ked itself to a more alert angle. The voices in the study had suddenly altered. Simon had said something in his usual dictatorial accents, and Copley, instead of the soft answer that turneth away wrath, had snapped a crisp rejoinder in louder tones than any he had yet used. For a minute the two men were speaking at once, discharging verbal salvos at point-blank range. Miss Ocky shrugged her shoulders and smiled rather scornfully to herself. She was not surprised. Lucy had told her of Copley's youthful flashes of temper, which still persisted, though he had learned in some measure to control them.

She was trying to guess the probable outcome of the battle of words when her thoughts were interrupted from another quarter. The bell of the front door had rung violently, and Bates hurried from the pantry and along the hallway to answer it. Miss Ocky wondered who in the world could be calling at such an hour.

She knew in a moment. There was the briefest of parleys with the butler, and then, through the door of the living-room, she saw two men hurry rearward through the hall in the direction of the study.

Evidently they proposed to present themselves before Varr without the formality of announcing themselves through Bates.

The first of the two she recognized instantly--it was Graham, the manager of the tannery, whom she had met several times. And he was Sheila's father! An awkward occasion for him to appear! The second man she did not know at all. He was smaller and slighter than Graham, a pale, anaemic creature. He lagged behind his companion, and as the latter kept a grip on his arm as they proceeded, he gave the effect of a lamb going reluctantly to the sacrifice.

Graham's face had been deeply flushed--so much she had had time to note as he swept past the open door. She heard him knock at the study--from sheer force of habit, no doubt, as he could not have waited for a summons to enter before flinging back the door. His voice carried clear to Miss Ocky's ear as he swiftly took up some remark he had caught from within.

"That will do, young man! I can fight my own battles with no help from you--!"

Obviously, events were marching to a proper row. Miss Ocky had no objection to rows when she could partic.i.p.ate in them, but to sit by and listen to others enjoying themselves was merely boresome. She put her book on the table, marking her place with the Persian dagger, rose and left the room. The angry voices from the study followed her upstairs as she sought the quiet of her own room.

Here she found Janet Mackay, seated in a corner with a dozen new handkerchiefs of linen that she was adorning with exquisitely embroidered initials. She looked up, but continued her work without speaking.

"h.e.l.lo, Janet. Why aren't you at the movies this evening?"

"They're showing a gripping picture of purple pa.s.sion," replied Miss Mackay succinctly. She snipped a thread, deftly inserted fresh thread in her needle and added casually, "It's a small world."

This was a sample of Janet's cautious, crab-like approach to some topic of interest. Miss Ocky recognized it and soon had encouraged her to persevere.

"A great thought, Janet, but scarcely a new one. What brought it to your mind?"

"A piece of news that Bates was telling me over our supper. He got it this afternoon from the postman. Did ye know that old Simon's kitchen garden had been looted the other night?"

"No."

"It was. The fellow took a few tomatoes and did a wee bit damage with his big feet. Old Simon found out who it was, and he had him arrested."

"Humph. He would. The man was probably hungry, poor devil."

"Aye; so they're saying in the town. No matter. Old Simon appeared against him this morning in court and they sent him to the lock-up for thirty days."

"Ninety meals! It might be worse. Who was it?"

"A young fellow named Charlie Maxon."

"Charlie Maxon! Well, he'll be no loss to the community for a month!"

"Aye?" Janet looked up sharply from her work. "Ye know him?"

"He's one of the leaders of the strike. I've spoken with him once or twice. A bad egg, I should think."

"Aye, and his parents before him," said Janet Mackay. "They used to live around the corner from me in Aberdeen. I can remember Charlie as a bairn, and even then he was always into mischief. He's no whit better now."

"And he turns up again in this little out-of-the-way place in America!

I see now why you say the world's a small one. Queer, but it's the way things sometimes happen. Are you sure it's the same?"

"Aye. Three times I've seen him in town and thought his face familiar, he looks so like his father. When Bates spoke his name, I knew."

"Well, I take it you won't remind him of the old times in bonnie Scotland!"

"No fear!" said the older woman promptly. Then she looked keenly at her mistress. "Aren't ye up early to-night?"

"Simon is having a row with Copley in the study." Miss Ocky shrugged her shoulders and made a grimace. "I didn't care to listen any longer."

"He's having a row with the boy, is he?" Janet regarded her work critically and bit off a thread neatly. "The old deevil! I'm glad I have been with you all this time, Miss Ocky, and not around that 'un!

I've heard a few things about him from Bates." She threaded another needle with deft fingers. "He's a rare curmudgeon. D'ye suppose he'll go on like this to the end of his days?"

"Can you teach an old dog new tricks?" asked Miss Ocky contemptuously.

"You should know better at your age, Janet." She got up and strolled out on the balcony to see the brilliant stars in a sky of velvet blackness. "Quarter past ten already. I shan't need you for anything to-night. If you insist on ruining your eyes with that work any longer, go off to your own room and let me get to bed!"

_VII: Out of the Past_

When the curtain rose on the scene of that interview between the tanner and his son, Simon was discovered at his desk laboriously making entries in his small, cramped handwriting in the red notebook that held so many of his secrets. He did not look up until he had completed the memorandum which engaged him; when he swung his chair around he still held the closed book in his hand and occasionally pounded his knee with it when he wished to emphasize some point in the ensuing conversation.

He had his notions of good generalship no less than his shrewd sister-in-law, and he did not make the mistake of pitching his prefatory remarks on a note of hostility. He was fishing for information. He hoped to get a clue to the reason for Copley's sudden elevation of spirit, if a reason really existed.

"I was a little pressed for ready money at the beginning of the month and did not see my way to making the usual deposit to your account," he began, utterly indifferent, so he were not caught, that he was being deliberately untruthful. "Hope it didn't embarra.s.s you. Things are easier, now, and I will attend to the matter to-morrow morning."

"Why--why, thank you, sir!" This was so unexpected that the young man was as bewildered as if a mine had exploded at his feet. "That is very good of you. I had no idea you were--were strapped." He flushed. "As a matter of fact, I thought--I thought--"

"Go on. What did you think?"

"Well, sir, I thought you were just giving me a reminder of my absolute dependence on you. I've been a pretty useless animal, I know."

"Why the past tense? Are you a useful animal now?"

"N-no, sir. I guess it would be exaggerating the facts if I claimed that! But my intentions are good." Simon's lips lifted. "I want to get busy at something useful right away."