“Panama,” she said sweetly, with a ring of tolerance in her voice.
The man turned about, fumbling nervously with his hands as he noticed the telltale object she was holding in the palm of her outstretched hand.
“Is this what you’ve been looking for?” she asked, pretending to be ignorant of the ring’s true purpose.
“Why, yeah—sure!” he replied, clumsily bringing himself to his feet again and unable to look at her. “I—er—I can’t imagine how it could have fallen out of my pocket!”
“The way we came, past the Mission,” she asked, “that’s the shortest road back, isn’t it?”
“Oh, sure, if you want to go that way,” he announced, putting the ring away in the pocket of his blouse, glad to once more have it out of sight.
“I—I think we’d better,” she said, “I’ve had a long trip and——”
“I understand, and I’m pretty tired now, anyway,” he interrupted, turning about and leading her back the way they had come, still conscious of the faux pas he made regarding the engagement ring, “You know somethin’?”
“What?”
“That ring I lost—” he stammered. “Well, I bought that for—er—my aunt!”