and her daughter, a shy wisp of a girl some twelve or thirteen years of age, were already seated at the table. Jack muttered greetings and applied himself silently to the cold meat and graham bread which, with crab-apple jelly and weak tea, comprised the meal. But his hostess was plainly elated, and after a few pregnant snuffles the secret was out. The western chamber was rented!
“And such a nice, pleasant-mannered young man he is,” she declared. “A Mr. Tidball, a junior. Perhaps you have met him?”
Jack shook his head.
“Well, I’m sure you’ll like him, and it’ll be real pleasant for you to have another student in the house. I know what it is to be alone” – she sniffed sadly – “since Mr. Dorlon died, and I guess you feel downright lonely sometimes up there. If you like I’ll introduce Mr. Tidball after supper?”
The widow appeared to find a mild excitement at the thought, and her face fell when Jack begged off. “Not this evening, please,” he said. “I’m going to be very busy, Mrs. Dorlon.”
“Oh, very well. I only thought – ” What she thought he never knew, for excusing himself he pushed back his chair and returned to his room. As he closed his door he heard the new lodger whistling cheerfully and tunelessly across the hallway.
He dragged a steamer trunk from under the bed, threw back the lid and unceremoniously hustled the contents on to the floor. Then he took a valise from the wardrobe and proceeded to pack into it what few belongings would serve him until he could send for his trunk. The latter he couldn’t take with him. In the first place, there was no way of getting it to the depot in time for the early train; in the second place, as he was not now able to pay Mrs. Dorlon the present month’s rent, he felt that he ought to leave something behind him as security. The prospect of going home raised his spirits, and he felt happier than he had for many months. He even hummed an air as he tramped busily between the wardrobe and the trunk, and the result was that the first knock on the door passed unheeded. After a moment the knock was repeated, and this time Jack heard it and paused in the act of spreading his Sunday trousers in the till and looked the consternation he felt. Who was it, he wondered. Perhaps Mrs. Dorlon come to hint about the rent; perhaps – but whoever it might be, Jack didn’t want his preparations seen. He softly closed the trunk lid and wished that he had locked the door. He waited silently. Perhaps the caller would go away. Then, as he began to think with relief that this had already happened, the knob turned, the door swung open, and a lean, spectacled face peered through the opening.
“I thought maybe you didn’t hear me knock,” said a queer, drawling voice. “I’ve taken the room across the way, and as we’re going to be neighbors I thought I’d just step over and get acquainted.”
The caller came in and closed the door behind him, casting an interested look about the shabby apartment. Jack, after an instant of surprise and dismay, muttered a few words of embarrassed greeting. As he did so he recognized in the odd, lanky figure at the door the hero of the accident at the river.
CHAPTER III
MR. TIDBALL INTRODUCES HIMSELF
The caller looked to be about twenty-one or two years of age. He was tall, thin, and angular, and carried himself awkwardly. His shoulders had the stoop that tells of much poring over books. His hands and feet were large, the former knotted and ungainly. His face was lean, the cheeks somewhat sunken; the nose was large and well-shapen and the mouth, altogether too broad, looked good-natured and humorous. He wore steel-rimmed spectacles, behind which twinkled a pair of small, pale-blue eyes, kindly and shrewd. His clothes seemed at first sight to belong to some one very much larger; the trousers hung in baggy folds about his legs and his coat went down behind his neck exposing at least an inch of checkered gingham shirt.
And yet, despite the incongruity of his appearance, he impressed Jack as being a person of importance, a man who knew things and who was capable of turning his knowledge to good account. Tidball? Where had he heard the name of Tidball? As he thought of it now, the name seemed strangely familiar. Recollecting his duties as host, Jack pushed forward the patent rocker.
“Won’t you sit down?” he asked.
The visitor sank into the chair, bringing one big foot, loosely encased in a frayed leather slipper, on to one knee, and clasping it with both knotted hands quite as though he feared it might walk off when he wasn’t looking.
“Queer sort of weather we’re having,” he drawled. He talked through his nose with a twang that proclaimed him a native of the coast. Jack concurred, sitting uncomfortably on the edge of the cot and wondering whether Tidball recognized him.
“Mrs. Thingamabob down-stairs said you were from Maine. Maine’s my State. I come from Jonesboro; ever hear of Jonesboro?”
“No, I don’t believe so.” The visitor chuckled.
“Never met any one who had. Guess I’m about the only resident of that metropolis who ever strayed out of it. There’s one fellow in our town, though, who went down to Portland once about forty years back. He’s looked on as quite a traveler in Jonesboro.”
Jack smiled. “My folks live near Auburn,” he said.
“Nice place, Auburn. By the way, my name’s Tidball – Anthony Z. Z stands for Zeno; guess I’m a sort of a Stoic myself.” The remark was lost on Jack, whose acquaintance with the Greek philosophers was still limited.
“My name’s Weatherby,” he returned. “My first name’s Jack; I haven’t any middle name.”
“You’re lucky,” answered the other. “They might have called you Xenophanes, you see.” Jack didn’t see, but he smiled doubtfully, and the visitor went on. “Well, now we know each other. We’re the only fellows in the hut and we might as well get together, eh? Guess I saw you this afternoon down at the river, didn’t I?”
Jack flushed and nodded.
“Thought so.” There was a moment’s silence, during which the visitor’s shrewd eyes studied Jack openly and calmly and during which all the old misery, forgotten for the moment, came back to the boy. Then —
“Guess you can’t swim, eh?” asked the other.
“No, not a stroke,” muttered Jack.
“Thought so,” reiterated Tidball. There was another silence. Then Jack said, with an uneasy laugh:
“There’s no doubt but that you can, though.”
“Me? Yes, I can swim like a shark. Down in Jonesboro we learn when we’re a year old. Comes natural to us coasters.”
“It was lucky you were there this afternoon,” said Jack.
“Oh, some one else would have gone in, I guess!”
“He – he didn’t – he wasn’t drowned, was he?”
“The kid? No, but plaguy near it. He’s all right now, I guess. Teach him a lesson.”
“Did the bridge go?” asked Jack after a moment, merely to break another silence.
“No, water was going down when I left. Guess I’m in the way, though, ain’t I?”
“In the way?”
“Yes; weren’t you doing something when I came in? Packing a trunk or something?”
“Oh, it – it doesn’t matter; there’s no hurry.”
“Going home over Sunday?”
“Y – yes.”
“You’re lucky; wish I was. But don’t let me interrupt; go ahead and I’ll just sit here out of the way, if you don’t mind my staying.”
“Not at all; I – I’m glad to have you.” And the odd thing about it, as Jack realized the next moment, was that he meant what he said. The visitor drew a little brier pipe from one pocket and a pouch from another.
“Smoke?” he asked.
“No,” answered Jack.
“Mind if I do?”
“Not