Page:Penrod by Booth Tarkington (1914).djvu/222

208 "And you think I'd better not come in to-night?"

"To-night!" she gasped. "Not for weeks! Papa would"

"But Margaret," he urged plaintively, "how can you blame me for"

"I have not used the word 'blame,'" she interrupted. "But I must insist that for your carelessness—to to wreak such havoc—cannot fail to—to lessen my confidence in your powers of judgment. I cannot change my convictions in this matter—not to-night—and I cannot remain here another instant. The poor child may need me. Robert, good-night."

With chill dignity she withdrew, entered the house, and returned to the sick-room, leaving the young man in outer darkness to brood upon his crime—and upon Penrod.

That sincere invalid became convalescent upon the third day; and a week elapsed, then, before he found an opportunity to leave the house unaccompanied—save by Duke. But at last he set forth and approached the Jones neighbourhood in high spirits, pleasantly conscious of his pallor, hollow cheeks, and other perquisites of illness provocative of interest.