Just then Mrs. St. Peter came out into the garden and asked her husband if he wouldn’t bring his young friend in to lunch.
Outland started and looked with panic toward the door by which he had come in; but the Professor wouldn’t hear of his going, and picked up his telescope to prevent his escape. As he carried it into the house and put it down in the hall, he noticed that it was strangely light for its bulk.
Mrs. St. Peter introduced the guest to her two little girls, and asked him if he didn’t want to go upstairs to wash his hands. He disappeared; as he came back something disconcerting happened.
The front hall and the front staircase were the only hard wood in the house, but as Tom came down the waxed steps, his heavy new shoes shot out from under him, and he sat down on the end of his spine with a thump. Little Kathleen burst into a giggle, and her elder sister looked at her reprovingly; Mrs. St. Peter apologized for the stairs.
“I’m not much used to stairs, living mostly in ’dobe houses,” Tom explained, as he picked himself up.
At luncheon the boy was very silent at first. He sat looking admiringly at Mrs. St. Peter and the little girls. The day had grown warm, and the Professor thought this was the hottest boy he had ever seen. His stiff white collar began to melt, and his handkerchief, as he kept wiping his face with it, became a rag.
“I didn’t know it would be so warm up here, or I’d have picked a lighter suit,” he said, embarrassed by the activity of his skin.
“We would like to hear more about your life in the Southwest,” said his host. “How long were you a call boy?”
“Two years. Then I had pneumonia, and the doctor said I ought to go on the range, so I went to work for a big cattle firm.”