"No, son; not this evening," he said. "I've been feeling sort of set up
and aristocratic to-day, and I've just ordered a dinner sent upstairs. I
reckon you'll join me?"
The young man was willing enough; more than willing, since he was now
ready to say a thing which must be said before he could be prepared to
set a time limit upon Gantry--a limit beyond which lay the firing of the
fuse and the blowing up of all things mundane.
"Certainly," he agreed. "Give me a few minutes to change my clothes--"
"You look good enough to me just as you are, boy," said the
dinner-giver, and he took his son by the arm and walked him to the
elevator.
In the private dining-room Blount found the table laid for two, much as
if his coming had been pre-figured. He let that go, and for the time the
talk was of the doings at Wartrace Hall: of the professor's enthusiastic
digging for fossils, of Patricia's keen enjoyment of the life in the
open, and--this put with gentle hesitation on the part of the
news-bringer--of Mrs. Honoria's growing affection for the young woman
whose ambitions reached out toward a sociological career.
"You say Patricia is learning to drive a car?" queried Patricia's lover.
"Best woman driver I ever saw," was the senator's praiseful rejoinder.
"Nothing feazes that little girl, and I'm telling you that she can turn
the wheels just about as fast as you want to ride.
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