Dr. Lavendar took off his broad-brimmed felt hat and wiped his
forehead with his big red bandanna. "Benjamin, what's got into you? A
little being in love won't hurt him. Why, before I was his age I had
lost my heart to my grandmother's first cousin!"
But the older man was not listening. His anger had suddenly hardened
into alarm; he even forgot the canaries. "She's going to help?
Lavendar, this is serious; it is very serious. He's got to be sent
away!--if I have to see"--his voice trailed into a whisper; he looked
at Dr. Lavendar with startled eyes.
The green cock hopped down into his glass tub and began to ruffle and
splash, but Benjamin Wright did not notice him. Dr. Lavendar beamed.
"You mean you'll see his father?"
The very old man nodded. "Yes; I'll have to see--my son."
"Thank God!" said Dr. Lavendar.
"Dominie," said Mr. Wright, "it's better to make your manners when
you've got your 'baccy.' Yes; I'll have to see--his father; if there's
no other way of getting him out of town?"
"Of course there's no other way. Sam won't go without his father's
consent. But you mustn't make play-writing the excuse; you mustn't
talk about that."
"I won't talk about anything else," said Benjamin Wright.
Dr. Lavendar sighed, but he did not encourage perversity by arguing
against it. "Benjamin," he said, "I will tell Samuel of your wish to
see him--"
"My wish!"
Dr. Lavendar would not notice the interruption. "Will you appoint the
time?"
"Oh, the sooner the better; get through with it! Get through with it!"
He stared at his visitor and blinked rapidly; a moment later he shook
all over. "Lavendar, it will kill me!" He was very frail, this
shrunken old man in the green dressing-gown and high beaver hat, with
his lower lip sucked in like a frightened child's. The torch of life,
blown so often into furious flame by hurricanes of rage, had consumed
itself, and it seemed now as if its flicker might be snuffed out by
any slightest gust. "He may come up to-night," he mumbled, shivering
in the hot sunshine and the drift of locust blossoms, as if he were
cold.
"It can't be to-night; he's gone out West. He gets back Saturday. I'll
send him up Sunday evening--if I can."
"Gad-a-mercy, Lavendar," Benjamin Wright said whimpering, "you've got
to come, too!" He looked at his old friend with scared eyes. "I won't
go to the gate with you. Can't leave these birds. I'm a slave to 'em."