“I don’t like him,” said Shirley.
Mr. Willing stepped back in surprise.
“You don’t like him?” he said in some amazement. “And because you don’t like one of my friends, is that any reason you should not treat him with respect?”
“I wasn’t disrespectful,” said Shirley, with something like a pout.
“You weren’t, eh? I’d like to know what you call it.”
“Well, I don’t like him,” said Shirley again,
“Why don’t you like him?” demanded Mr. Willing.
Shirley, mindful of the task she had set for herself, found it difficult to answer this question without arousing suspicion in her father’s mind, and for Jimmy’s sake she did not wish to do this. So she answered: “I just don’t.”
Mr. Willing threw up his hands in a gesture of dismay.
“Girls and women are too much for me,” he exclaimed.