Mrs. Pantin looked at her husband suspiciously. There were times when she had a notion that she had not explored the furthermost recesses of his nature--when she wondered if it had not ramifications and passages unknown to her. It had. It was Mr. Pantin's dearest wish to come home boiling drunk with his hat smashed and his necktie hanging. He longed to kick the front door in and see his wife cower before him. The mental orgies in which he indulged while sitting placidly in the bow window automatically snapping his Romeo against the heel of his foot by a muscular contraction of the toes--would have curdled the blood of Priscilla Pantin.
It was an interesting case of atavism. There was little doubt but that Mr. Pantin was a throwback to a sportive ancestor who had kept a pacer that could do a little better than 2.13 when conditions were favorable, but had rendered the family homeless by betting one hundred and sixty acres of black walnut timber against a horse that left him so far behind that the spectators urged him to throw something overboard to see if he was moving. All this was family history. Mr. Pantin fought against his predilection to gamble on anything or anybody as he would have fought an impulse to take human life.
It did not escape Mrs. Pantin's attention now that her husband had not answered her question as to whether he knew this notorious character. She repeated it.
Mr. Pantin returned her searching look with one in which she could discern no guile, but his words irritated her still further.
"I happened to be in the bank the other day when the girl was begging Wentz for time on the loan which Mormon Joe had contracted for running expenses," Mr. Pantin explained with somewhat elaborate carelessness. "It wasn't due, but they were putting the screws on her to serve their own purpose--or Neifkins' purpose, rather. He wants her leases. It was a mistake of judgment, for she would have been a good borrower. Bankers are born, not made, anyway," complacently, "and Vernon isn't one of them."
"It seems to me his judgment in this instance is excellent," Mrs. Pantin contradicted tartly. "It's quite evident the business men of Prouty agree with him, since none of them will trust her."
"That doesn't alter my opinion." Mr. Pantin's reply was calm. "It's the person behind a loan that counts, anyway--not the security. If I had been in Wentz's place when she said she could handle those sheep and meet the obligation when due, I should have believed her." Again Mr. Pantin waved the chop for emphasis as he added with something very like enthusiasm: "She has honesty, strength of character, intelligence, personal magnetism--"