She went. And though she darted a smile at their visitor, to Johnnie she seemed all indifference, and he was staggered by it; only to be more than gratified by her complete change of attitude when she got home at suppertime. "Oh, he's handsome!" she declared. "My! The girls wouldn't believe how noble and splendid he is! He just can't be as young as you say, Johnnie, because he's been a soldier in the big war! I know it by that little button-thing in his coat! Oh, Johnnie, he's nicer than you said! Thousands and thousands of times!"
Johnnie swaggered a bit over that. "All my friends is nice," he observed. "Only I wish I could have One-Eye and Mr. Perkins here both at the same time!"
He had to give a minute account of Mr. Perkins's visit, and not once, but as often as he could manage to go over the subject before Big Tom came in. After supper, as they hung in the window together, looking up at the night sky, he had to review all previous visits, as well as that memorable, history-making meeting under the Elevated.
"He's like a young gentleman in a story!" she whispered. "And he's awful stylish! Did you notice?—his handkerchief to-day had a teeny brown edge to it!"
In the morning, she did an unprecedented thing: rose earlier than usual and helped Johnnie set the flat to rights. The dish cupboard came in for the most of her attention, a fact which brought loud protests from him, for she used up the whole of Mr. Maloney's precious newspapers, this in making fancifully cut covers for the shelves.
"Oh, let's look civilized!" she cried.
She came home at noon, her girl friends accompanying her, but waiting, as before, in the area. She was not so shy as she had been the first day; instead, she was dignified as she viewed the arm- and leg-work, praised Johnnie with sweet condescension, and thanked Mr. Perkins for all his trouble with quite a grown-up air.
The noon following, she arrived alone (Mr. Perkins had remarked the day previous that he would be coming regularly now). As he had appeared early, and the exercising was over and done, he and Cis went down the stairs together. Johnnie stood outside the door to watch them, and marveled as he watched. When had he ever seen Cis smile so much? chatter so freely? Now she did not seem afraid of Mr. Perkins at all!
In the hall overhead some one else was watching—Mrs. Kukor. As he looked up, she nodded at him. "Ah-ha-a-a-a!" she whispered, and laid one finger along her nose mysteriously. Johnnie understood that she was thinking of Big Tom. He nodded back, and put a finger to his lips.
All that afternoon he was so proud, just thinking of Cis threading the crowds with Mr. Perkins at her side. Yet she herself was evidently not impressed by the great compliment the leader had paid her. For the next day she did not invite a similar experience by coming home at noon; nor the next. In fact, she never again dropped in to see the drill. She had lost interest in it, she told Johnnie—which was natural enough, seeing that she was a girl.
