“Of course I did! Clever of me, wasn’t it? Oh, you haven’t the entire monopoly of clever ideas, if you did mend your motor car with chocolate!”
Philip was gleefully chuckling at his successful ruse, and, when Patty realised that she couldn’t help herself, she laughed, too.
“Roger won’t mind, anyway,” she said; “he’s such a good-natured old duck. And I’ll make it up to him by taking him out for the whole day to-morrow, on a picnic with my new lunch basket. I’ve been wanting to try that lovely basket, and see if it will carry a picnic for two.”
Philip’s face suddenly lost its jovial smile. “There’ll be a ‘picnic for two,’ if you cut up any such trick as that! And you and young Farrington will see what kind of a picnic I mean! Why, Patty, you’re hostess of this house party of yours. You can’t desert all your other guests,—and go skylarking off with only one of them.”
“Unless it’s you,” said Patty, with a demure glance at him.
“Yes, unless it’s me,” said Philip, smiling broadly.
CHAPTER XVII
A DINNER AND A DANCE
When Patty and Philip reached home, a little later than the others, Roger was nowhere to be seen.
“Where’s Roger?” asked Patty, as she jumped out of the car, for she wanted to make peace with him at once.