Instead, he rose
and gazed sadly at his companion.
"He said it for a joke, Buttercups," he observed. "Joke. YOU know, a
joke. One of them things that--I tell you what: You look up 'joke' in
the dictionary and then, after you've found out what 'tis, I'll lend you
a patent-medicine almanac with one or two of 'em in it.... Well, I've
got to be gettin' under way. So long, Posy."
Possibly Primmie might have inquired further into the reasons which
led the Phipps' lodger to select for himself the name of the person
who "died lying," but that very afternoon, while on an errand in the
village, she heard the news that Nelson Howard had been offered a
position as operator at the Trumet wireless station, had accepted
and was already there and at work. Every professional gossip in East
Wellmouth was talking about it, not only because of its interest as a
piece of news, but because of the astonishing fact that no one but those
intimately interested had previously known of the offer.
"Why in the world," said Becky Blount, expressing the opinion of what
Captain Jethro Hallett would have called her "tribe," "he felt 'twas
necessary to hide it as if 'twas something to be ashamed of, _I_ don't
see. Most folks would have been proud to be offered such a chance.
But that Nelse Howard's queer, anyhow. Stuck-up, I call him; and Lulie
Hallett's the same way.
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