Going back in the train, Banneker reviewed the crowding events of the
day. At the bottom of his thoughts lay a residue, acid and stinging, the
shame of the errand which had taken him to The Retreat, and which the
memory of what was no less than a personal triumph could not submerge.
That he, Errol Banneker, whose dealings with all men had been on the
straight and level status of self-respect, should have taken upon him
the ignoble task of prying into intimate affairs, of meekly soliciting
the most private information in order that he might make his living out
of it--not different in kind from the mendicancy which, even as a hobo,
he had scorned--and that, at the end, he should have discerned Io
Welland as the object of his scandal-chase; that fermented within him
like something turned to foulness.
At the office he reported "no story." Before going home he wrote a note
to the city desk.
CHAPTER XI
Impenetrability of expression is doubtless a valuable attribute to a
joss. Otherwise so many josses would not display it. Upon the stony and
placid visage of Mr. Greenough, never more joss-like than when, on the
morning after Banneker went to The Retreat, he received the resultant
note, the perusal thereof produced no effect.
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