“Let’s go down to the post office,” suggested Gloria suddenly, with a determined attempt to throw off the impending gloom. “It’s wonderful out, Nanty, and I suppose you have been poking over that hot stove all afternoon.”
Jane agreed. It was a wonderful evening and she always enjoyed a quiet walk after tea, with Gloria.
“Don’t let’s do anything until we get back,” said the girl who was already slipping on a bright red sweater. “We can work after dark but we can’t see the sunset then.”
So it happened they met Tom Whitely coming toward their cottage. He was slicked up as he always was for evening, his very brown hair bubbling up in little curls in spite of all his troubles with it, and his fresh blue blouse showing his brown neck to advantage. The blue garment was sold as a blouse, his mother called it a waist, but Tom insisted that kind were shirts. He scorned anything else.
Seeing Jane, Tom wondered how he was going to get a word alone with Gloria. All three walked amiably along through the locust grove, but Tom did not appear to get much vim into his answers, and made no attempt at anything so positive as a question. He was very glum.
Finally, at Mrs. Mayhew’s, Jane stopped. “Suppose you two go on,” she said, “and I’ll stop and talk to Clara. There she’s alone on the porch, and I want to ask her something about apple jelly.”
This gave Tom his chance.
CHAPTER IV
NANCY TRIVETT
“Gloria,” he began directly, tugging at her arm and glancing anxiously about, “Gloria, please take this money back.”