“I think Miss Maverick is an awfully nice girl.”
“We all think so,” said Haight, in his blandest manner, “Mr. Morgan especially.”
“Oh,” said Morgan, angrily, but trying to speak indifferently, “she’s nice enough, as nice as girls of her class generally are.”
With a look of scorn and contempt that neither Haight nor Morgan soon forgot, Miss Gladden rose from the table and left the room, while Rutherford exclaimed indignantly:
“Whatever ‘her class’ is, she is deucedly your superior, you contemptible puppy!”
Lyle just then entering, there was an ominous silence for an instant; then Houston, rising from the table, remarked in a cool, even tone:
“There has been enough said for the present, but” turning toward Morgan and Haight, “I’ve something to say to you two, a little later.”
Morgan put on his hat and started sullenly for the office, but Haight, assuming his most ingratiating smile, stepped up to Houston, and, in a low tone, began to apologize. Houston interrupted him.
“There is no need of any words here,” he said coldly, “I shall call on you at the sorting rooms this morning, and shall then have something to say to you, but I wish no words from you, at all,” and retiring to his room, he left Haight in a state of considerable trepidation. He hurried after Morgan, and soon overtook him.
“I say,” he began, “we’ve got that new fellow stirred up, and I wish we hadn’t; I don’t want any trouble.”