'Can't be helped. I've got me instructions.'
'You always were game,' said Keggs admiringly. 'I used to see that
quick enough before you retired from active work. Well, good luck to
you, Mr. Dingle.'
Steve gathered up William Bannister, the wheelbarrow, the box of
bricks, and the dying pig and made his way to the gymnasium.
The worst of these pre-arranged scenes is that they never happen just
as one figured them in one's mind. Steve had expected to have to wait a
few minutes in the gymnasium, then there would be a step outside and
the old man would enter. The beauty of this, to Steve's mind, was that
he himself would be 'discovered,' as the stage term is; the onus of
entering and opening the conversation would be on Mr. Bannister. And,
as everybody who has ever had an awkward interview knows, this makes
all the difference.
But the minutes passed, and still no grandfather. The nervousness which
he had with difficulty expelled began to return to Steve. This was
exactly like having to wait in the ring while one's opponent tried to
get one's goat by dawdling in the dressing room.
An attempt to relieve himself by punching the ball was a dismal
failure. At the first bang of the leather against the wood William
Bannister, who had been working in a pre-occupied way at the dying pig,
threw his head back and howled, and would not be comforted till Steve
took out the rope and skipped before him, much as dancers used to dance
before oriental monarchs in the old days.
Steve was just saying to himself for the fiftieth time that he was a
fool to have come, when Keggs arrived with the news that Mr. Bannister
was too busy to take his usual exercise this morning and that Steve was
at liberty to go.
It speaks well for Steve's character that he did not go. He would have
given much to retire, for the old man was one of the few people who
inspired in him anything resembling fear. But he could not return
tamely to the studio with his mission unaccomplished.
'Say, ask him if he can see me for a minute. Say it is important.'
Keggs' eye rested on William Bannister, and he shook his head.
'I shouldn't, Mr. Dingle. Really I shouldn't. You don't know what an
ugly mood he's in. Something's been worrying him. It's what you might
call courting disaster.'
'Gee! Do you think I want to do it? I've just got to. That's all
there is to it.'
A few moments later Keggs returned with the news that Mr. Bannister
would see Dingle in the library.
'Come along, kid,' said Steve. 'Gimme hold of the excess baggage, and
let's get a move on.'
So in the end it was Mr. Bannister who was discovered and Steve who
made the entrance. And, as Steve pointed out to Kirk later, it just
made all the difference.
The effect of the change on Steve was to make him almost rollicking in
his manner, as if he and Mr. Bannister were the nucleus of an Old Home
Week celebration or two old college chums meeting after long absence.
Nervousness, on the rare occasions when he suffered from it, generally
