“Indeed! Why not go back with me?”
“You can take the girl back if you want to, but now that I’m getting my chance at you I may not go.”
Redfield’s tone was entirely cordial as he turned to Lee. “I came hoping to carry you away. Will you come?”
“I’m afraid I can’t unless mother goes,” she replied, sadly.
Lize waved an imperative hand. “Fade away, child. I want to talk with Mr. Redfield alone. Go, see!”
Thus dismissed, Lee went back to the restaurant, where she found the Forester just sitting down to his luncheon. “Mr. Redfield will be out in a few minutes,” she explained.
“Won’t you join me?” he asked, in the frank accent of one to whom women are comrades. “The Supervisor has been telling me about you.”
She took a seat facing him, feeling something refined in his long, smoothly shaven, boyish face. He seemed very young to be District Forester, and his eyes were a soft brown with small wrinkles of laughter playing round their corners.
He began at once on the subject of his visit. “Redfield tells me you are a friend of Mr. Cavanagh’s; did you know that he had resigned?”
She faced him with startled eyes. “No, indeed. Has he done so?”