“No! Why, what did you think when she did that?”
“I was startled, of course. She said, ‘Gypsy, have another sandwich!’ and I looked up at her in amazement, though not a bit offended, you know, and she laughed. ‘Who started that name for you?’ she asked. ‘You’re looking so surprised that maybe you don’t like it,’ she went on. ‘I just heard Betty Lee call you that one time and I thought it cute. I told Mathilde Finn just the other day that you looked like a gypsy queen or something awfully romantic.’
“There it was, Betty, just the sweet way you thought about it and not the way Mathilde told me. You were right. I don’t believe Peggy Pollard would say mean things about a girl she knows as well as she does me, and maybe not about anybody, though you are too trustful of your friends, Betty!”
“Am I?”
“Yes, I’m afraid so; but I think it’s a good fault and I’m going to cultivate it.”
Kathryn slipped her hand through Betty’s arm as she spoke. “Well, just then Carolyn spoke up. ‘Mathilde Finn didn’t say it that way when she repeated it to Kathryn,’ she said.”
“‘What do you mean, Carolyn?’ Peggy asked. She looked just as surprised as could be. Then she whirled around to me. ‘Kathryn, what did Mathilde tell you?’
“I sort of hesitated, you know. A body would. And Peggy asked me again. ‘From what Carolyn says, I imagine that Mathilde has said something horrid,’ she said.
“Well, I just got the impression, Peggy, that you were criticising my looks and while I’m not posing as a beauty, it wasn’t awfully pleasant to think that you would say what Mathilde said you did.”
“‘Kathryn!’ Peggy said. She looked sort of helpless, you know, as if she didn’t know what to say and probably thought I wouldn’t believe her. Then, I don’t remember how it all came around, but Carolyn helped out and quoted what Peggy had just said and asked me to believe Peggy and I said I would and Peggy said a lot of things and I hated to have them think I wanted to be thought pretty and so I said so and I told just exactly what Mathilde had said and Peggy told as nearly as she could remember just exactly what she had said, and the girls all said that they didn’t think me sensitive about my looks and knew that I just cared about having Peggy like me. So it turned out all right and it was Carolyn that did it after all. You can like Carolyn better than me any time, Betty!”