“Hello! quite a party,” he said. “Won't anybody offer a fat, old man a seat?”
He walked between Lorna and Gay, up the steps, and peered into the shadows of the porch.
“Is that you, Miss Redding?” he asked.
Henrietta had hoped she would not be seen. At that moment there was no one she less wished to see than Johnnie Alberson.
“No, this is Miss Bates,” she said; and Johnnie, excusing himself for making the mistake, went to her end of the porch and took the chair at her side. He was pleased, because he had hoped to find her there. It had been a thought of Henrietta that had sent him tramping up the long hill. He had, after Henrietta's visit to the drug store, thought of Henrietta quite a little and he had decided that—unless his memory deceived him—she was just about the finest woman he had ever seen; that she was the sort of woman with whom he would enjoy a flirtation, let it go as far as it might.
“Like meeting an old friend,” he said, putting his hat carefully on the floor. “And I hope we'll be better friends. Mother has gone to Dubuque to spend a couple of weeks and I'm going to ask Miss Redding to take me in, if she has room.”
“That will be nice,” said Henrietta warmly, but she felt that the coming of Johnnie was almost too much.