Genevieve colored angrily.
"That was no bid for his favor, and you know it, Tilly Mack!"
"No?" teased Tilly, hatefully. "Well, I'm sure I should have thought it was if a perfect stranger flung herself in my way like that."
"Tilly, Tilly—don't!" begged Cordelia, almost tearfully.
It was Genevieve's turn to lift a disdainful chin. She eyed Tilly scornfully.
"Oh, no, you wouldn't—not if some other perfect stranger had just called out a particularly hateful, horrid joke about something you were not in the least to blame for! If you hadn't said what you did, I shouldn't have said what I did, Tilly Mack. As it was, I—I just couldn't help it; I was so sorry for him!"
"Oh, it was just being sorry, then! Oh, excuse me; I didn't know," cooed Tilly, smoothly. "You see, it looked so—different!"
"Tilly!" gasped Cordelia. "Genevieve, don't you mind one bit what she says!" But Genevieve, without a word, had turned and was walking swiftly away.
"Well, Tilly Mack," chorused several indignant voices; and Elsie Martin added severely: "I've got my opinion of you—after all Genevieve has just done for us! I'm sure, I think it was lovely of her to speak to that boy like that!"
Tilly flushed uncomfortably. Her tongue had gone much farther than she had intended it to go. She did not like to think, either, of that Texas trip just then. But the very shame that she felt made her only the more determined not to show it—then.