“Won’t!” she returned succinctly.
Bob drew yet nearer. He believed she was quite capable of carrying out that threat of swallowing it.
“But how can I complete telling your fortune—aw!—unless I see the other hand?” expostulated the monocle-man with a pleasant smile. “I desire especially to examine the Mount of Venus.”
“There isn’t any mountain any more,” said the jolly little pal. “It’s been moved away.”
“Aw! How interesting! Then we might survey the vale of friendship.”
She looked around like a bird in a snare; the hammer-man was not far away and impulsively she flew over to him.
“Was this our dance? I’m so forgetful!”
“It wasn’t, but it is,” he returned with a smile. Obviously he was flattered. Heretofore Miss Dolly had not acted particularly prepossessed by the hammer-thrower; he hadn’t any temperament—so she thought; he didn’t swing one around with enough abandon. He was one of those serious goody-goody dancers. He swung Miss Dolly very seriously now; they went so slowly for her that once she stumbled over his feet. It was evident their temperaments didn’t match. Or maybe what she held in one hand had made her terribly self-conscious. Bob watched them gloomily. He feared she might swallow it during the dance, but she didn’t, for the little hand was partly closed still when she left the hammer-thrower and Bob gazed around for that confounded monocle-man. The latter, however, had apparently lost interest in palm-reading and the temperamental little thing, for he was nowhere to be seen. Miss Dolly’s eyes were at once frightened and strange when she fluttered again to Bob’s side.
“Oh, I’ve done the most awful thing,” she confided quite breathlessly to him.
“You—you haven’t swallowed it?” he exclaimed in alarm. He thought he had watched her closely, but still she might have found opportunity—she might have made a swift movement to her lips which he had failed to observe.