“I’ll go tomorrow then.”
“It will tear the boys to pieces,” Adam said. “I don’t know what they’ll do. Maybe you’d better sneak off and let me tell them afterward.”
“It’s my observation that children always surprise us,” said Lee.
And so it was. At breakfast the next morning Adam said, “Boys, Lee is going away.”
“Is he?” said Cal. “There’s a basketball game tonight, costs ten cents. Can we go?”
“Yes. But did you hear what I said?”
“Sure,” Aron said. “You said Lee’s going away.”
“But he’s not coming back.”
Cal asked, “Where’s he going?”
“To San Francisco to live.”
“Oh!” said Aron. “There’s a man on Main Street, right on the street, and he’s got a little stove and he cooks sausages and puts them in buns. They cost a nickel. And you can take all the mustard you want.”
Lee stood in the kitchen door, smiling at Adam.
When the twins got their books together Lee said, “Good-by, boys.”
They shouted, “Good-by!” and tumbled out of the house.
Adam stared into his coffee cup and said in apology, “What little brutes! I guess that’s your reward for over ten years of service.”
“I like it better that way,” Lee said. “If they pretended sorrow they’d be liars. It doesn’t mean anything to them. Maybe they’ll think of me sometimes—privately. I don’t want them to be sad. I hope I’m not so small-souled as to take satisfaction in being missed.” He laid fifty cents on the table in front of Adam. “When they start for the basketball game tonight, give them this from me and tell them to buy the sausage buns. My farewell gift may be ptomaine, for all I know.”
Adam looked at the telescope basket Lee brought into the dining room. “Is that all your stuff, Lee?”
“Everything but my books. They’re in boxes in the cellar. If you don’t mind I’ll send for them or come for them after I get settled.”
“Why, sure. I’m going to miss you, Lee, whether you want me to or not. Are you really going to get your bookstore?”
“That is my intention.”
“You’ll let us hear from you?”
“I don’t know. I’ll have to think about it. They say a clean cut heals soonest. There’s nothing sadder to me than associations held together by nothing but the glue of postage stamps. If you can’t see or hear or touch a man, it’s best to let him go.”
Adam stood up from the table. “I’ll walk to the depot with you.”
“No!” Lee said sharply. “No. I don’t want that. Good-by, Mr. Trask. Good-by, Adam.” He went out of the house so fast that Adam’s “Good-by” reached him at the bottom of the front steps and Adam’s “Don’t forget to write” sounded over the click of the front gate.
2
That night after the basketball game Cal and Aron each had five sausages on buns, and it was just as well, for Adam had forgotten to provide any supper. Walking home, the twins discussed Lee for the first time.
“I wonder why he went away?” Cal asked.
“He’s talked about going before.”
“What do you suppose he’ll do without us?”
“I don’t know. I bet he comes back,” Aron said.
“How do you mean? Father said he was going to start a bookstore. That’s funny. A Chinese bookstore.”
“He’ll come back,” said Aron. “He’ll get lonesome for us. You’ll see.”
“Bet you ten cents he don’t.”
“Before when?”
“Before forever.”
“That’s a bet,” said Aron.
Aron was not able to collect his winnings for nearly a month, but he won six days later.
Lee came in on the ten-forty and let himself in with his own key. There was a light in the dining room but Lee found Adam in the kitchen, scraping at a thick black crust in the frying pan with the point of a can opener.
Lee put down his basket. “If you soak it overnight it will come right out.”
“Will it? I’ve burned everything I’ve cooked. There’s a saucepan of beets out in the yard. Smelled so bad I couldn’t have them in the house. Burned beets are awful—“Lee!” he cried, and then. “Is anything the matter?”
Lee took the black iron pan from him and put it in the sink and ran water in it. “If we had a new gas stove we could make a cup of coffee in a few minutes,” he said. “I might as well build up the fire.”
“Stove won’t burn,” said Adam.
Lee lifted a lid. “Have you ever taken the ashes out?”
“Ashes?”
“Oh, go in the other room,” said Lee. “I’ll make some coffee.”
Adam waited impatiently in the dining room but he obeyed his orders. At last Lee brought in two cups of coffee and set them on the table. “Made it in a skillet,” he said. “Much faster.” He leaned over his telescope basket and untied the rope that held it shut. He brought out the stone bottle. “Chinese absinthe,” he said. “Ng-ka-py maybe last ten more years. I forgot to ask whether you had replaced me.”
“You’re beating around the bush,” said Adam.
“I know it. And I also know the best way would be just to tell it and get it over with.”
“You lost your money in a fan-tan game.”
“No. I wish that was it. No, I have my money. This damn cork’s broken—I’ll have to shove it in the bottle.” He poured the black liquor into his coffee. “I never drank it this way,” he said. “Say, it’s good.”
“Tastes like rotten apples,” said Adam.
“Yes, but remember Sam Hamilton said like good rotten apples.”
Adam said, “When do you think you’ll get around to telling me what happened to you?”
“Nothing happened to me,” said Lee. “I got lonesome. That’s all. Isn’t that enough?”
“How about your bookstore?”
“I don’t want a bookstore. I think I knew it before I got on the train, but I took all this time to make sure.”
“Then there’s your last dream gone.”
“Good riddance.” Lee seemed on the verge of hysteria. “Missy Tlask, Chinee boy sink gung get dlunk.”