“You do hope that?” said downright Trevor.
“Yes—of course,” said Tiny, ingenuously opening her soft eyes, and meeting his this time without a blush. “It would be so unpleasant—so unneighbourly for there to be dissension between us,” and she held out her hand. “Good morning, Mr Trevor.”
If he might only have kissed it! But it would have been enough to stamp him as a boor, and he contented himself with pressing it tenderly as he bent over it.
“Good morning, Mr Trevor,” said Fin, holding out her hand in turn, and she gazed at him out of her laughing, mischievous eyes, till a dull red glow spread over his bronzed cheeks, and he squeezed her fingers so that she winced with pain.
“Good morning,” he said. “Eh—what is it?”
“Oh, dear!” cried Fin, shutting her eyes, “here’s that horrid, solemn-looking little man coming, just in the way we want to go.”
“Then, let me introduce you,” said Trevor, laughing, as Pratt came sauntering along, whistling and cutting off fern leaves with his stick, till he saw the group in front, when he became preternaturally solemn.
“Pratt, let me introduce you to my neighbours. Miss Rea—Miss Finetta Rea—my old friend, Frank Pratt.”
“Pratt! What a disgusting name!” said Fin to herself, as, with a tender display of respect that his friend did not fail to notice, Trevor performed the little ceremony out there amid the gleaming sunbeams; and then they parted.
“Oh, Tiny, isn’t he delicious?” cried Fin, as soon as they were out of hearing. “Isn’t he grand?”