Neale was busy with the car in preparation for their return to Milton. The little girls were watching him at work, and Mrs. Heard was resting in the car, too. So Ruth and Agnes went alone down to the pavilion.
“Dear me,” sighed Agnes. “I really wish we could have just one spin on the floor—just us two. That music makes my feet fairly itch.”
“You will have to possess your soul with patience—or else scratch your poor little feet,” laughed her sister. “To think of your wanting to dance here! I am afraid all these people—especially the boys—are not nice.”
“I don’t care. I don’t want to dance with them,” pouted Agnes. “Only with you. I just love to dance to this piece the orchestra is playing.”
“Save it till next week’s school dance,” laughed Ruth. “Oh!”
Her startled ejaculation was brought out by the appearance of a strange young man at her elbow. He was really not a nice looking fellow at all, his face was unpleasantly freckled, and the corners of his lips and the ends of the first three fingers of his right hand were stained deeply by the use of cigarettes.
“Aft’noon!” said this stranger, affably. “Want a whirl? The floor’s fine—come on in.”
Agnes, who was much more timid in reality than she usually appeared, shrank from the fellow, trying to draw Ruth with her.
“Let the kid wait for us,” suggested the freckled young man, leering good-naturedly enough at Agnes, and probably not at all aware that he was distasteful to the Kenway girls. “We can have one whirl.”
“I am much obliged to you,” Ruth said, rather falteringly. “I would rather not.”