“You like to get all tired out, I suppose.”
“I get rested—afterward.”
“And it doesn’t matter, anyway, of course,” he gibed.
“Not a bit,” she smiled.
“Yes, I suspected that.” Mr. Smith was still sitting erect, still speaking with grim terseness. “But let me tell you right here and now that I don’t approve of that doctrine of yours.”
“‘Doctrine’?”
“That ‘It-doesn’t-matter’ doctrine of yours. I tell you it’s very pernicious—very! I don’t approve of it at all.”
There was a moment’s silence.
“No?” Miss Maggie said then, demurely. “Oh, well—it doesn’t matter—if you don’t.”
He caught the twinkle in her eyes and threw up his hands despairingly.