“Oh!” cried Nellie suddenly. “Don’t go, Jackie—don’t go!”
“S’long,” Jacqueline nodded to the boys. “I’m coming back to-morrow. I’ll say you’ve shown me one grand time!”
They were looking at her with big eyes, as if she were a stranger. Oh, dumb-paste that skirt and slip-over! If only she could have kept the Peggy Janes.
“Jump in!” bade her Uncle Jimmie, in his military voice, which Jacqueline fancied only when he joked. She suspected that he was in no mood for joking now.
She scuttled into the wide seat of the roadster beside Judge Holden, who nodded to her gravely. Uncle Jimmie folded his long legs into the seat beside her.
“Good-night, Mrs. Conway, and many thanks,” he said.
The car was turning. In a moment the top would shut away the sight of them, the dear friendly people who were not her own, standing there with surprised, reproachful faces, in the dusk that was about to swallow them up.
“Good-by, Aunt Martha,” Jacqueline called. “I’ll see you to-morrow.”
The roadster had quite turned now, and was heading for the road.
“Jackie! Jackie!” That was Freddie’s voice, lifted in a howl of anguish. “I want my Jackie—Jackie!”