Twenty minutes later we had a little reunion in the Purdy-Pell lib'ry. Robin was holdin' some cracked ice to a lump on his forehead, and Uncle Noah was sittin' uncomf'table on the edge of a big leather chair.
"How cheery!" says I. "But take it from me, Uncle, you're some two-fisted scrapper! I didn't think it was in you."
"We-e-ell," he drawls out, still breathin' a bit hard, but gettin' back his gentle smile, "I didn't want to do no fursin' with them constables; but you know Mistuh Phil he told me to see that Robin didn't git into no trouble, and--and--we-e-ell, I didn't care for their motions none at all, I didn't. So I jes' had to tap 'em a little."
[Illustration: "Now see hea-uh, Mistuh Vonstable," says he, "I wouldn't go for to do anything like that."]
"Tappin' is good!" says I. "And how about you, Robin? How do you come to be mixin' it up so conspicuous?"
"I'm sorry," says he. "I suppose I made an awful ass of myself. But even if she is a public dancer, that snipe shouldn't have insulted her. Of course I'd found out long before that Miss Toots was no longer anything to me; but----"
"Then that was the famous Maggie, was it?" I breaks in. "The one that lured you up from Dixie?"
"Not exactly a lure," says he. "She didn't think I'd be chump enough to come. But that's all off now."
"I ain't curious," says I, "but the fam'ly has sort of delegated me to keep track of your moves. What's next, if you know?"
Robin shrugs his shoulders sort of listless. "I don't know," says he. Then he turns to Uncle Noah. "Uncle," says he, "how will those scuppernongs be about now on the big arbor in front of Uncle Phil's?"
"Bless you, Mistuh Robin," says old Noah, "they'll be dead ripe by now, and there's jes' doodlins of 'em. Miss Peggy Culpepper, she'll be mighty lonesome, a pickin' of 'em all by herself."
"Humph!" says Robin, tintin' up. "Think so, do you?"
"I don't have to think, Mistuh Robin," says Uncle Noah. "Miss Peggy told me that herself the mornin' I come away."
Young Mr. Hollister gazes earnest into them gentle old blue eyes for a second, then he takes a turn or two up and down the lib'ry, and fin'lly claps Uncle Noah on the shoulder. "I've been waiting all summer for a taste of those grapes," says he. "Come, we can just catch the midnight. I've had enough of Broadway to last me for a long time."