"You didn't come to tell her about something?"
"Nothing whatever, my dear sir. I wished merely the honour of
seeing her and chatting with her upon indifferent subjects."
"Why?"
"Did you see her?"
"No, I'm sorry to----"
"She's home, all right," Hedrick took pleasure in informing him.
"Yes. She was lying down and I told your mother not to disturb
her."
"Worn out with too much automobile riding, I expect," Hedrick
sniffed. "She goes out about every day with this Corliss in his
hired roadster."
They walked on in silence. Not far from Mrs. Lindley's, Hedrick
abruptly became vocal in an artificial laugh. Richard was
obviously intended to inquire into its cause, but, as he did not,
Hedrick, after laughing hollowly for some time, volunteered the
explanation:
"I played a pretty good trick on you last night."
"Odd I didn't know it."
"That's why it was good. You'd never guess it in the world."
"No, I believe I shouldn't. You see what makes it so hard,
Hedrick, is that I can't even remember seeing you, last night."
"Nobody saw me. Somebody heard me though, all right."
"Who?"
"The nigger that works at your mother's--Joe."
"What about it? Were you teasing Joe?"
"No, it was you I was after."
"Well? Did you get me?"
Hedrick made another somewhat ghastly pretence of mirth. "Well, I
guess I've had about all the fun out of it I'm going to. Might as
well tell you. It was that book of Laura's you thought she sent
you."
Richard stopped short; whereupon Hedrick turned clumsily, and
began to stalk back in the direction from which they had come.
"That book--I thought she--sent me?" Lindley repeated, stammering.
"She never sent it," called the boy, continuing to walk away. "She
kept it hid, and I found it. I faked her into writing your name on
a sheet of paper, and made you think she'd sent the old thing to
you. I just did it for a joke on you."
With too retching an effort to simulate another burst of
merriment, he caught the stump of his right stilt in a pavement
crack, wavered, cut in the air a figure like a geometrical
proposition gone mad, and came whacking to earth in magnificent
disaster.
Richard took him to Mrs. Lindley for repairs. She kept him until
dark: Hedrick was bandaged, led, lemonaded and blandished.
Never in his life had he known such a listener.