Page:Stringer - Lonely O'Malley.djvu/277

 devious gross fictions as to certain weird adventures and perils which had once beset his father in the Klondike, but later in the day, while basking in the presence of a jug of lemonade and a plate of Mrs. Sampson's tea-cakes, he had lied, deliberately and consciously—lied voluntarily, openly, and unnecessarily. The gossipy and garrulous and yet religion-loving Widow Tiffins, the secret aversion of the long-suffering Sampson household, was there; and had not only driven the Preacher himself into the upper regions of the house, but had prolonged her loquacious visit well on into the afternoon, until Mrs. Sampson, in desperation, had called in Lonely and Lionel Clarence, in the hope that an audience so diversified might cause the lean and ferret-eyed widow to turn to topics less maliciously personal. But still she had tarried.

A moment's silence had finally fallen on the little company as a door blew shut in the June breeze, and Lonely had just sunk his teeth into a fifth tea-biscuit, when the humanly peevish voice of the descending and sadly deluded Preacher sounded from the front stair-way.