“I hope Miss Madison will not think I forgot her,” he disingenuously said, “when in replying to Mrs. Grangeon’s invitation I begged permission to bring you, and that she will do me the honor some day very soon–”
“Oh, Estelle won’t mind!”
The mention of Estelle seemed to change the color of Mrs. Hawthorne’s thoughts, casting a shadow over them.
“Estelle and I had a spat this morning,” she told him.
“Oh!”
“That’s why I was sweeping and why she’s gone for a walk by herself.”
“I’m so sorry!” was all he found to say.
“It doesn’t amount to anything,” she cheered him. “We’ve had times of quarreling all our lives, and we’ve known each other since we were children. Her aunt and my grandmother had houses side by side in the country; there was just a fence between our yards. That’s how we first came to be friends. All our lives we’ve had the way of sometimes saying what the other doesn’t like. And do you know what’s always at the bottom of it? That each one thinks she knows what would be most for the other’s good to do, and we get so mad because the other won’t do what we ourself think would be best for her! Just as some people abuse you because you’re a pig, we as likely as not abuse the other because she isn’t a pig. One of the biggest fights we ever had was because once late at night, when she was dead tired, tired as a yellow dog, I wanted her to sit still and let me pack for her, or, anyhow, let me help her pack. And she said I was as tired as she,–as if that was possible!–and if I didn’t go to bed and get some rest myself and let her alone to get through her packing as 145she pleased if it was daylight before she finished she should have a fit. And from one thing to another we went on getting madder and madder till we said things you would have thought made it impossible for us ever to speak to each other again. But the first thing next morning, when we opened our eyes, we just looked at each other and began to laugh. Another time we fought like cats and dogs because I wanted to give her something and she refused to take it.”
“I don’t call those quarrels, Mrs. Hawthorne.”
“You would if you could hear us; you would have if you could have heard us this morning. And it was only a little one. You see, two people aren’t best friends for nothing. It gives you a sort of freedom; you aren’t a bit afraid. And when you know it’s only the other’s good you have at heart, it makes you awfully firm and fast-set in your point of view. I don’t mind telling you that I’m always the one in the wrong.”