“Well, what they don’t know won’t hurt them, will it?” she demanded. “Goodness! I have to let myself go once in a while, or I would burst! They are regular barbarians——”
“You don’t have to live among them,” interrupted Frank sternly.
“Neither do you,” snapped his sister.
“I have to be on the job. There’s not much doing on the construction work now, I know; but I’ve got to watch it. I tell you frankly, Annette, I’d feel better if you took a trip to New York and stayed there. You’ll do or say something yet that will get you in bad with the whole town.”
“‘Bah! bah! black sheep! have you any wool’?” laughed Annette. “But if you have, you can’t pull it over my eyes. You want me away so you can run around with that Day girl——”
“Now stop, Annette!” exclaimed her brother angrily. “You don’t know Janice, and you have taken a dislike to her and so are determined not to know her. I don’t run around after her. I like her. She is a good, jolly girl; but there’s no foolishness between us, and you know it!”
As she saw that he had become seriously angry, Annette began to make her peace and smooth over the trouble.
“You’ll come over to the barn dance, anyway, won’t you, dear?” she concluded. “It will be a failure without you.”
“I don’t suppose there’s a rig to be got for love or money,” Frank objected. “About everybody’s going.”
“Oh! you can find somebody that will let you squeeze in.”