“Hush, Patty! Don’t talk such absolute rubbish! I know Bill Farnsworth, and I know——”
“You don’t know the girl——”
“Jealous! Fie, Patty, for shame!”
“But, Nan,” interposed Bumble, “as Patty says, what does it mean? I wouldn’t doubt Little Billee’s faith and loyalty either, only, in the face of this thing, what can we think?”
“I’ll never believe Bill meant that! He’s teasing you——”
“A pretty way to tease!” Patty was angry now. “And you know he isn’t a tease. He never plays jokes like Kit Cameron, or Chick Channing might. No, Nan, he has been bowled over by a Washington girl and he wants to get rid of me!”
“Patty,” and Nan spoke very seriously, “it isn’t right for you so to doubt the man you’ve promised to marry. I can’t, I won’t believe that he means this as you take it!”
“How else can he mean it? If you’ll give me a rational explanation of what he does mean, I’ll be only too glad. I’ve thought and thought, and I can’t imagine any meaning but the actual fact that the printed words say to send the valentine back if his love is dead,—and he did send it back! Now, for your explanation!”
“I don’t know, Patty. I confess I don’t. It isn’t like him to do it to tease you.”
“Of course, it isn’t! He’d never do such a cruel, heartless thing as that,—if he still loved me. So, he has done the cruel thing,—and it’s because he doesn’t love me!”