"You're certain that we do understand each other?" Her gaze met his squarely. "You're not going to expect things that can't ever be?"
"No, ma'am," said Archie.
Tears suddenly came into her eyes. There was a quality in this faithful, doglike devotion that made her feel ashamed. It deserved response; it deserved something better than mere affectionate gratitude. But that was all she found herself able to give.
With a demonstrativeness rarer than he guessed, she caught his big hand in both of hers and held it for a moment to her cheek. When she let it go there was a tear on the back of it; which Archie, gazing at wonderingly, suddenly lifted to his lips.
It was in acts like this, little untaught gestures of pure reverence, that the boy belied his slang and his big ears and his general clumsiness, and harked back to the age of chivalry, when a gentleman was not ashamed to dedicate himself to the service of his lady, and be her very perfect knight....
After he had gone, Effie May wandered into Joan's room with a slight air of expectancy about her which the girl was too preoccupied to notice.
"You're lookin' sort of white about the gills, dearie," she remarked. "Does the shoulder pain you?"
"No. But something else does, and I don't know just what. Oh, Effie May, what's the matter with me, anyway?" she burst out. "Sometimes I think I'm not a human person at all, but just a big inflated Ego, floating around like an observation balloon, taking notes!"
"Well, well, is that so?" murmured her step-mother, who had her doubts as to what an Ego might be. "I expect what you need for that floaty feeling, dearie, is a good dose of calomel—" and she hurried away to prepare it.