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Page 26
"Well, Agnes Olive, if you feel that you have profited so much by his
benefactions, then you are not playing fair if you don't invite some of
us down to meet your 'special,' when he comes next week. Mary, what do
you think? A.O. has a _suitor_! A boy from home. He is to come next
week, armed with a note from her 'fond payrents,' giving him permission
to call. After talking about him all term and getting my curiosity up to
fever heat about such a paragon as she makes him out to be, she blasts
all my hopes by flatly refusing to let me meet him. Pig!" she made a
grimace of mock disgust at A.O.
"I wouldn't care, if you weren't such an awful tease," admitted A.O.
"But I know how you'll criticize him afterward. You'll make a byword of
everything he said and quote it to me till kingdom come. _You_ know how
it would be, don't you, Mary?" turning to her. "You wouldn't want her
taking notes on everything he said if you had a--a--a friend--"
"'Oh, call it by some better name, for friendship sounds too cold,'"
interrupted Elise.
"Well, I haven't any a--a--whatever it is Elise wants to call it," said
Mary, laughing. "I only wish I had. I've always thought it would be nice
to have one, but I suppose I'll have to go to the end of my days
singing: 'Every lassie has her laddie, Nane they say hae I.' That has
always seemed such a sad song to me."
"Oh, oh!" cried Elise, perversely, who seemed to be in a mood for
teasing everybody. She pointed an accusing spoon at her before putting
it back in her mouth.
"What about Phil Tremont, I'd like to know! He saved her from an Indian
once, A.O., out on the desert. It was dreadfully romantic. And when he
was best man at Eugenia Forbes's wedding, and Mary was flower girl, Mary
got the shilling that was in the bride's cake. It was an old English
shilling, coined in the reign of Bloody Mary, with Philip's and Mary's
heads on it. That is a sure sign they were meant for each other. Phil
said right out at the table before everybody that fate had ordered that
he should be the lucky man. Mary has that shilling this blessed minute,
put away in her purse for a pocket piece, and she carries it everywhere
she goes. I saw it yesterday when she was looking in her purse for a
key, and she got as red as--as red as she is this minute."
Elise finished gleefully, elated with the success of her teasing. "My!
How you are blushing, Mary. Look at her, A.O." Her dark eyes twinkled
mischievously as she sang in a meaning tone:
"Amang the train there is a swain
I dearly lo'e mysel'.
But what's his name or where's his hame
I dinna choose to tell."
"I'm not blushing," protested Mary, hotly. "And it is silly to talk that
way when everybody knows that Phil Tremont never cared anything for any
girl except Lloyd Sherman."
"Maybe not at one time," insisted Elise. "And neither did Lieutenant
Logan care about any girl but my beloved sister Allison at one time. I'm
not mentioning names, but you know very well that she's not the one he
is crazy about now. Just wait till fate brings you and Phil together
again. You'll probably meet him during the Christmas vacation if you go
to New York."
Mary made no answer, only thrust a knife under the edge of the candy in
the largest plate, as if her sole interest in life was testing its
hardness. Then she spread out several sheets of paraffine paper with a
great show of indifference. It had its effect on Elise, and she promptly
changed her target back to A.O. There was no fun in teasing when her
arrows made no impression.
Usually A.O. enjoyed it, but she had tangled herself in a web of her own
weaving lately, and for the last few days had been in terror lest Elise
should find her out. Inspired by the picture of the handsome young
lieutenant on Elise's desk, and not wanting to seem behind her room-mate
in romantic experiences, silly little A.O. had drawn on her imagination
for most of the confidences she gave in exchange. When Elise talked of
the lieutenant, A.O. talked of "Jimmy," adding this trait and that grace
until she had built up a beautiful ideal, but a being so different from
the original on which she based her tales, that Jimmy himself would
never have recognized her dashing hero as the bashful fellow he was
accustomed to confront in his mirror.
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