“ME!” Mrs. Sheridan looked both helpless and frightened. “No.” She shook her head decidedly. “It wouldn't do any good.”
“I won't risk her turnin' me out o' the house. Some way, that's what I believe she did to Sibyl, from what Roscoe said once. No, I CAN'T--and, what's more, it'd only make things worse. If people find out you're runnin' after 'em they think you're cheap, and then they won't do as much for you as if you let 'em alone. I don't believe it's any use, and I couldn't do it if it was.”
He sighed with resignation. “All right, mamma. That's all.” Then, in a livelier tone, he said: “Ole Gurney took the bandages off my hand this morning. All healed up. Says I don't need 'em any more.”
“Why, that's splendid, papa!” she cried, beaming. “I was afraid--Let's see.”
She came toward him, but he rose, still keeping his hand in his pocket. “Wait a minute,” he said, smiling. “Now it may give you just a teeny bit of a shock, but the fact is--well, you remember that Sunday when Sibyl came over here and made all that fuss about nothin'--it was the day after I got tired o' that statue when Edith's telegram came--”
“Now wait!” he said, laughing and pushing her away with his left hand. “The truth is, mamma, that I kind o' slipped out on you that morning, when you wasn't lookin', and went down to ole Gurney's office--he'd told me to, you see--and, well, it doesn't AMOUNT to anything.” And he held out, for her inspection, the mutilated hand. “You see, these days when it's all dictatin', anyhow, nobody'd mind just a couple o'--”
He had to jump for her--she went over backward. For the second time in her life Mrs. Sheridan fainted.
It was a full hour later when he left her lying upon a couch in her own room, still lamenting intermittently, though he assured her with heat that the “fuss” she was making irked him far more than his physical loss. He permitted her to think that he meant to return directly to his office, but when he came out to the open air he told the chauffeur in attendance to await him in front of Mr. Vertrees's house, whither he himself proceeded on foot.
Mr. Vertrees had taken the sale of half of his worthless stock as manna in the wilderness; it came from heaven--by what agency he did not particularly question. The broker informed him that “parties were interested in getting hold of the stock,” and that later there might be a possible increase in the value of the large amount retained by his client. It might go “quite a ways up” within a year or so, he said, and he advised “sitting tight” with it. Mr. Vertrees went home and prayed.