“I wish you’d seen Charlie Loomis looking at this ring to-day,” she said, with a desolate laugh. “He happened to notice it, and I saw him keep glancing at it, and I wish you’d seen Charlie Loomis’s expression!”
Collinson’s own expression became noticeable upon her introduction of this name; he stared at her gravely until he completed the mastication of one of the indigestibles she had set before him; then he put down his fork and said:
“So you saw Charlie Loomis again to-day. Where?”
“Oh, my!” she sighed. “Have we got to go over all that again?”
“Over all what?”
“Over all the fuss you made the last time I mentioned Charlie’s name. I thought we settled it you were going to be a little more sensible about him.”
“Yes,” Collinson returned. “I was going to be more sensible about him, because you were going to be more sensible about him. Wasn’t that the agreement?”
She gave him a hard glance, tossed her head so that the curls of her bobbed hair fluttered prettily, and with satiric mimicry repeated his question: “ ‘Agreement! Wasn’t that the agreement?’ Oh, my, but you do make me tired, talking about ‘agreements’! As if it was a crime my going to a vaudeville matinée with a man kind enough to notice that my husband never takes me anywhere!”
“Did you go to a vaudeville with him to-day?”
“No, I didn’t!” she said. “I was talking about the time when you made such a fuss. I didn’t go anywhere with him to-day.”