He was muttering to himself and his face was working
with emotion. Between baffled malice and suppressed hatred he
looked almost as if he were going to cry. Even amid his own
feelings of thankfulness and relief Jed felt a pang of pity for
Phineas Babbitt. The little man was the incarnation of spite and
envy and vindictive bitterness, but Jed was sorry for him, just as
he would have been sorry for a mosquito which had bitten him. He
might be obliged to crush the creature, but he would feel that it
was not much to blame for the bite; both it and Phineas could not
help being as they were--they were made that way.
He heard an exclamation at his shoulder and turned to find that
Captain Sam had also been regarding the parting at the gate.
"Humph!" grunted the captain. "Phin looks as if he'd been eatin'
somethin' that didn't set any too good. What's started him to
obeyin' orders from that Grover man all to once? I always thought
he hated soldierin' worse than a hen hates a swim. . . . Humph! . . .
Well, that's the second queerest thing I've run across to-day."
Jed changed the subject, or tried to change it.
"What's the first one, Sam?" he hastened to ask. His friend looked
at him for an instant before he answered.
"The first one?" he repeated, slowly. "Well, I'll tell you, Jed.
The first one--and the queerest of all--is your findin' that four
hundred dollars.
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