“Well, now, what do you suppose I was going to write about?” asked his sister, already beginning to show a heightened color.
“Can’t imagine. Nothing wrong with mother, I hope?”
Since his marriage Cornelia had been in the habit of communicating frequently with her brother by letter. It was the best way of keeping him informed of family affairs. The telephone at the senior Ryan house was sufficiently secluded to make it a useful medium of private communication, but the telephone at the junior Ryan house did not share this peculiarity, and Dominick discouraged his sister’s using it.
“No, mother’s all right,” said Cornelia. “And it’s nothing wrong about anybody. Quite the other way; it’s something about me, and it’s something cheerful. Guess!”
Her brother looked up and his eye was caught by her rosily-blushing cheeks.
“Dear me, Cornie,” he said with a look of slowly-dawning comprehension, “it really isn’t—it really can’t be——?”
The waiter here interrupted further confidence by setting forth the lunch with many attentive bowings and murmurings. By the time he had presented one dish for Cornelia’s approval, removed it with a flourish and presented another, her impatience broke out in an imploring,
“Yes, Etienne, it’s all perfectly lovely. Do put it on the table and let’s eat it. That’s what it’s for, not to hand round and be stared at, as if it were a diamond necklace that I was thinking of buying.”
Etienne, thus appealed to, put the viands on the table, and Dominick, deeply interested, leaned forward and said,
“What is it? Go ahead. I’m burning up with curiosity.”