To this characterization of Evelyn Lucy took opposing views. Her friend, as a matter of fact, wasn't in the least lonely, but was excellent company for herself, and led a full life. She was not the marrying kind. If she liked men it was only because they played the games she liked to play better than women play them. "Imagine Evelyn," she said, "unable to eat, unable to sleep! Imagine her sitting at the window in her nightgown and looking pensively at the moon!"
"Funny," I said, "but that's just what I was imagining. All girls do it and some wives. It's as much a part of a girl as long hair, and the fear of spiders. If a girl didn't get her moon bath now and then, she'd just shrivel up and die."
"Well," said Lucy, and she pretended to sigh, "there may be something in it. But not for Evelyn."
A moment later.
"Listen," she said, "just to make me out wrong, and win my good money you wouldn't——"
"My word," I said, "you are suspicious. But I thought you were a born matchmaker. I thought you'd be pleased if you got Evelyn and me married!"
"It wouldn't do at all," she said.
"Why not?"
"Oh," she said, "if you must know, it's because I like you—both—better the way you are."
And from a walk she put her pony into a brisk gallop, and I followed suit, and caught up with her. And I was a little moved and troubled by what she had said. For it seemed to me as if she had said it of me alone, and that the inclusion of Evelyn in that delayed and hanging fire "both" of her phrase had been an afterthought.