“I didn’t, and I don’t, and I don’t want to! But when I see my little hostess going around with a sad and forlorn expression on her face, and one of her guests looking as if he’d lost his last friend, and then they both go for a motor ride and come back jubilantly chummy,—why, then,—I Sherlock it out that they’ve had a squabble and a make-up! Am I altogether wrong?”
“Not altogether,” said Patty, demurely.
CHAPTER XX
A NARROW ESCAPE
The picnic was the real thing. That is, it was the real old-fashioned sort of a picnic, and it was therefore a novelty to most of its participants.
Patty had been on many motor picnics, where elaborate luncheons were served by white-garbed waiters, with the same appointments of silver, glass, and china that she would use at home. But not since her Vernondale days had she attended this sort of picnic. There were no servants. The simple but appetising luncheon was spread on a tablecloth laid on the grass, and, true to tradition, a grasshopper now and then leaped in among the viands, or an audacious spider attempted to approach the feast. But these were few and easily vanquished by the brave and valiant men of the party.
The men, too, proved themselves capable in the arts of fire-building and coffee-making, so that Patty, who was a born cook and loved it, found no use for her talent. So she and the other girls set the table as daintily as they could with the primitive means at their command, and decorated it prettily with wild flowers.
“As a rule,” said Elise, as she sat with a sandwich in one hand and a glass of lemonade in the other, “I like silver forks and china plates at a picnic, but, for once, I do think these wooden butter plates and paper napkins are rather fun. What do you think, Patty?”
“Far be it from me to cast reflections on the goods my host provides, but, generally speaking, I confess I like my table a few feet above the over-attentive population of Mother Earth.”
“Oh, pshaw, Patty!” exclaimed Philip. “You’re no kind of a sport! You’re a pampered darling of luxurious modernity.”