CHAPTER XI.
TOO LATE.
When Harry Lang was told that Charlie was dead, he looked shocked for the moment, then, having remarked glibly that "it was all for the best," and "at any rate he wouldn't suffer any more," he told Jessie to make haste and get him some food, and became absorbed in making his own plans for his own comfort.
He hated trouble, and sadness, and discomfort of others' making, and he made up his mind at once to go away out of it for a time, and not return until the funeral, at any rate, was over.

So at the end of his meal he announced to Jessie that he had to go away for a week on business.

He wouldn't bother her mother by telling her about it now, while she was worn out and trying to rest, but Jessie could tell her by and by.
What he should have done, of course, was to remain at home and relieve his poor stricken wife of all the painful details that necessarily followed the seeing about the little coffin, the grave, and the funeral.

But Harry Lang had trained people well for his own purposes.

No one ever expected assistance of any kind from him; so, instead of missing him, most people felt his absence as only a great relief.