Chip greeted this with a laugh. “Do you plaster it on as thick as that with every one,” she queried, “and will they stand it?”
“Why, yes,” he chuckled, “and almost beg for more. My ladies thrive on flattery, and unless a man doles it out to them, they think him stupid.”
When he had helped her out of the boat, holding and pressing her hand unduly long she thought, he gathered up the lilies and, with a graceful bow and “Sweets to the sweet,” offered them to her.
“I don’t want them,” she answered bluntly. “Take them to your arrant hypocrites and tell them a girl you couldn’t fool sent ’em.” And nonplussed a little at this speech, but still smiling, he followed Chip to the house. At the gate he halted and their eyes met.
“I’ve had a most charming morning, for which I thank you,” he said. And drawing two of the largest blooms from the bunch of lilies, he laid the rest on the gate-post. “You will have to take them,” he added. “And now I have something else to propose. I own a small yacht. It is anchored down near the wharf. How would you like a sail to-morrow? I shall be highly pleased to have you for my guest. Will you go?”
But Chip was not caught so easily.
“I’ll go if you will ask Aunt Abby also,” she answered, “not otherwise.”
“Why, of course,” he responded graciously, “that is understood.”
And still unruffled by this parting evidence of distrust, he bowed himself away.