Page:Booth Tarkington - Alice Adams.djvu/437

 error: "Yes, it does look a good deal that way. But of course we can't tell; we're never certain about anything—not about anything at all. Sometimes I look at it another way, though. Sometimes it looks to me as if a body's troubles came on him mainly because he hadn't had sense enough to know how not to have any—as if his troubles were kind of like a boy's getting kept in after school by the teacher, to give him discipline, or something or other. But, my, my! We don't learn easy!" He chuckled mournfully. "Not to learn how to live till we're about ready to die, it certainly seems to me dang tough!"

"Then I wouldn't brood on such a notion, papa," she said.

"'Brood.?' No!" he returned. "I just kind o' mull it over." He chuckled again, sighed, and then, not looking at her, he said, "That Mr. Russell—your mother tells me he hasn't been here again—not since"

"No," she said, quietly, as Adams paused. "He never came again."

"Well, but maybe"

"No," she said. "There isn't any 'maybe.' I told him good-bye that night, papa. It was before he knew about Walter—I told you."