“He’d better put Splodgkins in if he wants to make it sell,” said she. “Only they mightn’t allow it at the libraries. Splodgkins’s vocabulary is fortunately sometimes indistinguishable for his lisp.”
“Splodgkins couldn’t be translated,” put in Basil. “He sometimes comes to tea with me and G; but he is almost too exhausting. I think he knows every bad word in the English language; but one has to forgive him because he always saves half his cake for his baby sister, and hurls violent abuse at any one who dares to disparage her.
“Are you going?...” as G got up. “I’m sure Miss Pritchard doesn’t want you to leave us.”
“Miss Pritchard!...” In a horrified voice.
“Never mind,” said Hal quickly. “It didn’t matter.” Then to Basil, in explanation: “G said something about Doris’s fiancé, not knowing I was his sister, but I quite forget what it was. Good-bye, G,” holding out a frank hand. “I think you’re a delightful person, and I’m just as glad as Basil that you weren’t left out of the alphabet.”
A few minutes later Doris came in, looking flushed and stealthy, and the first thing Hal noticed was a loverly little diamond brooch she had not seen before.
“What a darling brooch,” she exclaimed, after their greeting. “Did Dudley give you that? He might have shown it to me.”
“No...” stammered Doris, turning red. “I’ve had it a long time. It’s not real.”
“Well, it’s a wonderful imitation, then” said Hall a little drily—and remembered the man like a pawnbroker’s shop.
Then Ethel joined them, and Hal’s quick eyes saw the still increasing anxiety, just as surely as she saw the increased furtiveness in Doris’s side-long glances. And because of all that she felt for Ethel, she trust her own care into the background resolutely, and made the evening as gay as she could while she was there.