"I'm horrid!" Sheila's eyes were wounded with remorse.
"Oh, well, I'm not expecting understanding any more."
"Oh, but I do—I do understand!" she said eagerly and she put her hand shyly on his arm. "I think I do understand you. I'm very grateful. I'm very fond of you."
"Ah!" said Sylvester softly. "That's a good hearing!" He lifted his arm with Sheila's hand on it and touched it with his lips. "You got me plumb stirred up," he said with a certain huskiness. "Well!" She took away her hand and he made a great show of returning to common sense. "I reckon we are a pretty good pair of friends, after all. But you mustn't be scared of me, Miss Sheila. That does hurt. Let's forget you told me that."
"Yes—please!"
"Well, then—to get back to business. Do you recollect a story I told you?"
"A story? Oh, yes—about an Englishman—?"
"Yes, ma'am. That Englishman put his foot on the rail and stuck his glass in his eye and set his tumbler down empty. And he looked round that bar of mine, Miss Sheila. You savvy, he'd been all over the globe, that feller, and I should say his ex-perience of bars was—some—and he said, 'Hudson, it's all but perfect. It only needs one thing.'"
This time Sheila did not ask. She waited.
"'And that's something we have in our country,' said he." Hudson cleared his throat. He also moistened his lips. He was very apparently excited. He leaned even farther forward, tilting on the front legs of his chair and thrusting his face close to Sheila's "'A pretty barmaid!' said he."