“Of course,” Maida assented, but her lip trembled and her eyes showed signs of ready tears.
“Cheer up,” Genevieve babbled on. “I’m your friend—whatever comes with time!”
“So am I,” put in Curtis Keefe. “Good-bye for a few days, Miss Wheeler.”
How Maida did it, she scarcely knew herself, but she forced a smile, and even when Samuel Appleby gave her a warning glance at parting she bravely responded to his farewell words, and even gaily waved her hand as the car rolled down the drive.
Once out of earshot, Appleby broke out:
“I played my trump card! No, you needn’t ask me what I was, for I don’t propose to tell you. But it will take the trick, I’m sure. Why, it’s got to!”
“It must be something pretty forcible, then,” said Keefe, “for it looked to me about as likely as snow in summertime, that any of those rigid Puritans would ever give in an inch to your persuasions.”
“Or mine,” added Genevieve. “Never before have I failed so utterly to make any headway when I set out to be really persuasive.”
“You did your best, Miss Lane,” and Appleby looked at her with the air of one appraising the efficiency of a salesman. “I confess I didn’t think Wheeler would be quite such a hardshell—after all these years.”
“He’s just like concrete,” Keefe observed. “They all are. I didn’t know there were such conscientious people left in this wicked old world!”