Even if we leave myself out of consideration entirely, I can't inflict that agony upon her!"
Peewee had been backing away from the door. The emotions, if not all the words of what the men were saying, were quite plain to him. His feelings had been stirred by their talk about Mrs. Markyn. They should not, he was determined, hurt her. The exact nature of the hurt to be inflicted on her was not wholly clear, but he understood that it was through him that it was to come to her. Because his father had found him—or rather was about to find him—she was to suffer.
He resented the means of prevention which they proposed for this. They should not, he was resolved, put him with someone to be taken care of; that would be no better than the Boys' Home. He did not, he considered, have any need of a father. He had got on very well without one—better than he would with a parent who proposed to send Burke and Mundy private operatives to look for him. They did not know, of course, what expertness he had gained in avoiding such agents.
