Kathryn, still regardless of the waggling little tail, shook her head in vehement negation.
"Oh, he wouldn't be shy with me, Miss Keltridge. Remember, I'm quite an old married woman now; there's no reason he should feel at all—Besides, he sees you," she added, her voice sharpening with the sudden recollection.
Olive laughed.
"Me? Oh, I'm totally amorphous, Mrs. Brenton, a mere lump of old associations. It's good for Mr. Opdyke to have somebody to giggle with occasionally."
Kathryn's voice betrayed her dislike of the flippant answer.
"Poor dear man! I guess he doesn't giggle very often. Really, Miss Keltridge, I sometimes wonder if you realize how very sad it is."
"Very likely not," Olive said dryly.
"No; that's what I say. You see him so often that you get used to it. It is so easy to take such things as a matter of course."
"You think so?" The dryness was increasing. "It never had occurred to me to feel like that."
"No?" Then all at once Kathryn dropped her antagonisms and smiled across at Olive. "Dear Miss Keltridge, I don't want to gossip; but, between old friends like ourselves, one can speak out. Has it ever seemed strange to you that we none of us know just what is wrong with Reed Opdyke? Or do you know?"