“I should think so,” said Miss Pinnegar.
Suddenly she sank into a chair, and burst into tears, wailing:
“Your poor father! Your poor father!”
“I’m sure the dead are all right. Why must you pity him?”
“You’re a lost girl!” cried Miss Pinnegar.
“Am I really?” laughed Alvina. It sounded funny.
“Yes, you’re a lost girl,” sobbed Miss Pinnegar, on a final note of despair.
“I like being lost,” said Alvina.
Miss Pinnegar wept herself into silence. She looked huddled and forlorn. Alvina went to her and laid her hand on her shoulder.
“Don’t fret, Miss Pinnegar,” she said. “Don’t be silly. I love to be with Ciccio and Madame. Perhaps in the end I shall marry him. But if I don’t—” her hand suddenly gripped Miss Pinnegar’s heavy arm till it hurt—“I wouldn’t lose a minute of him, no, not for anything would I.”