“Well, if here isn't Sappho!” he greeted her gaily. Missy blushed. Not for worlds had she suspected he was hearing her, that unlucky morning in the grape-arbour, when she recited her latest Poem to Miss Princess. Now she smiled perfunctorily, and started to pass him.
But Mr. Hackett, swinging his stick, stood with his feet wide apart and looked down at her.
“How's the priestess of song, this fine morning?” he persisted.
“All-right,” stammered Missy.
He laughed, as if actually enjoying her confusion. Missy observed that his eyes were red-rimmed, and his face a pasty white. She wondered whether he was sick; but he jauntily waved his stick at her and went on his way.
Missy, a trifle subdued, continued hers.
But oh, it is a wonderful world! You never know what any moment may bring you. Adventures fairy-sent surprises, await you at the most unexpected turns, spring at you from around the first corner.
It was around the very first corner, in truth, that Missy met young Doc Alison, buzzing leisurely along in his Ford.
“Hello, Missy,” he greeted. “Like a lift?”
Missy would. Young Doc jumped out, and, in a deferential manner she admired very much, assisted her into the little car as though she were a grown-up and lovely young lady. Young Doc was a nice man. She knew him well. He had felt her pulse, looked at her tongue, sent her Valentines, taken her riding, and shown her many other little courtesies for as far back as she could remember. Then, too, she greatly admired his looks. He was tall and lean and wiry. His face was given to quick flashes of smiling; and his eyes could be dreamy or luminous. He resembled, Missy now decided—and marvelled she hadn't noticed it before—that other young man, Lochinvar, “so faithful in love and so dauntless in war.”