Dorothy pored over the blue print for a long time. She was growing so nervous that all the little white lines on the paper began dancing about and grinning at her, and Mr. Akerson’s voice and Tavia’s in the other room became louder and louder. Every footstep as the clerks returned, one by one, from lunch, set her heart palpitating, and she clenched her hands nervously. She feared that Mr. Akerson would in some way evade them, disappear before Ned and the boys could arrive!
Tavia seemed so calm and self-possessed and examined the books so critically that Dorothy marveled at her! Surely Tavia could not understand so complicated a thing as a ledger! Off in the distance, at the end of the suite, Dorothy suddenly saw a familiar brown head, and behind a shaggy white head, and then a pair of great, braid shoulders, and in back of them a modish bonnet framing the dignified face of Aunt Winnie!
“Dorothy,” she called, running forward. “Here they are!”
Dorothy’s interest in the prints ceased instantly, and she sprang after Tavia.
Mr. Akerson’s face blanched and he withdrew to his private office.
All the clerks returned discreetly to their work, typewriters clicking merrily, as the family filed down through the offices and into Mr. Akerson’s private room. He faced them all until he met the clear eyes of Mrs. White, then he shifted uneasily and requested Bob, who came in last, to close the door.
“What’s it all about, Dorothy?” asked Bob in clear, cool tones, as he looked with rather a contemptuous glance at the agent. “Has someone been annoying you?” and he seemed to swell up his splendid muscles under his coat-sleeves—muscles that had been hardened by a healthy, active out-of-door life in camp.
“If there has,” continued Bob, as he looked for a place in the paper-littered office to place his hat, “if there has, I’d just like to have a little talk with them—outside,” and the lad nodded significantly toward the hall.
“Oh, Bob!” began Dorothy. “You mustn’t—that is—Oh, I’m sure it’s all a mistake,” she said, hastily.
“That’s more like it,” said Mr. Akerson, and he seemed to smile in relief. Somehow he looked rather apprehensively at Bob, Tavia thought. She, herself, was admiring the lad’s manliness.