“Well, anyhow, there he was at the depot and he grabbed right aholt of your Uncle Foster soon’s ever he got the chance. Varunas was standin’ right alongside--course he wasn’t tryin’ to listen, you understand, but he just heard--and he heard the cap’n say he was busy and for Millard to let him alone. Mil, he wouldn’t let him alone. ‘It’s mighty important,’ says he. ‘It’s somethin’ you’d ought to know, Cap’n Foster. Somethin’ you’ll thank me for tellin’ you when you do know it.’ Varunas says the cap’n turned ’round then and looked at him, kind of funny and more interested, as Varunas thought. ‘What’s it about?’ says he. Now Varunas, he couldn’t hear what Millard said next on account of Millard’s standin’ up on tiptoes and whisperin’ it in your uncle’s ear. Varunas says if he’d realized Mil was goin’ to start in whisperin’ he’d have come over nigher. But he didn’t.” “Well, well! What then?” “Well, then, accordin’ to Varunas’s story, your Uncle Foster stood there, pullin’ his whiskers and lookin’ at Millard queerer than ever. Finally, he seemed to make up his mind. ‘Get in that car,’ he says. ‘You can ride with me far as Denboro,’ says he, ‘and tell me on the way.’ Millard said somethin’ about having no change along with him to pay fare, and how he didn’t know’s he’d ought to leave Reliance alone at mail time. Cap’n Foster barked at him, the way he does at folks he don’t like--yes, and them he does like, sometimes. The way he’s barked at me when I haven’t done a thing except what was my business to do, is enough--but there! _I_ understand him. Lord knows I’d ought to! And--” “Is there any more?” “Why, not much. Cap’n Foster barked out that he’d attend to the fare and if Millard took the night train back from Denboro he’d get home same time the mail did. So they got into the cars together and--and that’s all.... But, Esther, don’t _you_ know what your Uncle Millard wanted to see your Uncle Foster about? Varunas and me, we’ve been tryin’ to guess and guess, but-- Mercy me! You ain’t goin’ away now, are you? Why, you ain’t said a word, scurcely.” Esther might have made the justifiable retort that she had been given no opportunity to say a word. She did not make it, however. She spoke of her headache and that she would not be down for supper. She went up to her room and remained there. CHAPTER XIX When, the next morning, pale and heavy-eyed, she was making a pretense of breakfasting, Nabby came in from the kitchen with an announcement. “Esther,” she said, “your Aunt Reliance Clark is here at the side door. She wants to see you, she says. I told her you was eatin’ your breakfast, but she said never mind, she’d wait till you got done. Pretty early in the mornin’ to come callin’, seems to me.” Esther rose from the table. “Aunt Reliance!” she exclaimed. “Why, that is odd. Ask her to come into the library, please, Nabby.”