Admiring Telfer's flow of words he pretended to be filled with scorn. "The
night is too hot for eloquence," he bellowed. "If you must be eloquent
talk of ice cream or mint juleps or recite a verse about the old swimming
pool."
Telfer, wetting his finger, thrust it into the air.
"The wind is in the north-west; the beasts roar; we will have a storm," he
said, winking at Valmore.
Banker Walker came into the store, followed by his daughter. She was a
small, dark-skinned girl with black, quick eyes. Seeing Sam sitting with
swinging legs upon the cracker barrel she spoke to her father and went out
of the store. At the sidewalk she stopped and, turning, made a quick
motion with her hand.
Sam jumped off the cracker barrel and strolled toward the street door. A
flush was on his cheeks. His mouth felt hot and dry. He went with extreme
deliberateness, stopping to bow to the banker, and for a moment lingering
to read a newspaper that lay upon the cigar case, to avoid the comments he
feared his going might excite among the men by the stove. In his heart he
trembled lest the girl should have disappeared down the street, and with
his eyes, he looked guiltily at the banker, who had joined the group at
the back of the store and who now stood listening to the talk, while he
read from a list held in his hand and Wildman went here and there doing up
packages and repeating aloud the names of articles called off by the
banker.
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