"It is not!" He agreed with her emphatically. He had come from a small town himself and he knew. "I think I'll make a little story out of this. I'm a newspaper man, you know, and there isn't anything a city editor likes better than he does a human interest story. I have a hunch that there is a lot of human interest in that kid."
"I fancy you are right. I'm a librarian myself, and I should be at my library this blessed moment. I'd far rather go down and help Mary Rose," and she laughed scornfully because she had such simple tastes.
He looked as if he admired them. "If you feel that way you surely aren't under the spell of that wicked witch Independence that Mary Rose talks of." There was nothing scornful in his laugh. It held so little scorn and so much admiration that she flushed.
"Independence!" she shrugged her shoulders. "I learned long ago that independence is just another word for loneliness. My friend, Miss Thorley, doesn't agree with me. We have very warm arguments over it."
"They haven't been warm enough to disturb me. You're very quiet neighbors. Doesn't the very quiet get on your nerves sometimes? It's something just to hear people, when you are alone and have no one to talk to."
"Lonely! You?" She was astonished. "I don't see how a young man could be lonely." Evidently her idea of masculine life was a merry round of social pleasure.
His laugh was a trifle bitter. "A man can be lonely for exactly the same reason a girl can," he asserted. "I've lived here for three months, and this is the first time I've spoken to you."
The color deepened in her cheeks. "I suppose I shouldn't be talking to you now but—Mary Rose—and we are neighbors. One does get so suspicious living with suspicious people," apologetically.
"Please don't be suspicious of me. I'm the most harmless man in Waloo. I'm too busy hanging on to my job to be dangerous. I propose a vote of thanks to Mary Rose for bringing us together. All in favor say aye. The ayes have it." He held out his hand.
She laughed consciously, but after a second she gave him her fingers. "It is pleasant to be able to speak to one's neighbors," she admitted with a hint of formality that in some way pleased Mr. Strahan.