"Dot's as vindictive as I am!" joked Louise. "Remember all the dark futures I used to wish for Bess Hulbert?"
"Poor Bess!" sighed Linda. "She certainly got hers——"
Thinking that the girls had heard enough of Linda's unpleasant experiences, Ted interrupted them by suggesting that they all go somewhere and have something to eat.
"If it's cool, I'm for it," agreed Louise, jumping up and putting her hand through her husband's arm.
"You're not too tired, are you, Linda?" she inquired.
"Not a bit!" protested the girl. "I feel like a new person since you three arrived.... There's a lovely screened tea-garden across the street that looks awfully attractive. Shall we go there?"
Linda was right in her impression; the place was charming. Instead of the customary artificial flowers or tiny bouquets so often seen in restaurants, real rose-bushes showered their profusion of fragrance all about the edges of the screen garden. Surprisingly, every one was hungry; the three visitors because they had eaten only a light picnic supper, Linda because she had been too homesick to eat much alone. The food proved as delightful as the surroundings, and they all enjoyed it immensely.
While Dot was, eating her ice, she noticed some people that she seemed to remember—sitting at a table in back of Linda. But she could not place them.
"Linda," she said softly, "see that young man over there at that table back of you—to the right—with an older woman? Don't turn around now, he's staring at us.... He looks sort of familiar to me, and I'm positive I've seen that woman before. Do you know them, or are they people I have met at Palm Beach sometime, one of those winters when we went to Florida?"
Linda waited a moment, and then casually turned her head in the direction which Dot had indicated. The boy was Jackson Carter!