"Perhaps I shouldn't say it—"
"Why not? Can't you trust me?"
"Oh, it wasn't that. But it might seem unkind."
"Nonsense," and the young man gave Viola a reassuring look. "A thing said in good faith is never unkind."
"I'm so glad you feel that way. Alice is so different, and I have been just dying to talk to somebody—somebody who would look at things as I do. Sometimes I am almost homesick."
"I suppose you are," said the youth, falling a victim to the girl's coquetry as readily as water runs down hill. "A fellow is never that way—homesick, I mean; but for a girl—"
"Oh, yes," sighed Viola, "this visiting is not all it is supposed to be. Alice is a lovely girl, of course, but—"
"A trifle high flown," said Tom, trying to help the faltering girl with her criticism.
"And so strangely fascinated with that Dorothy." Viola toyed evasively with the stick of her parasol. "Of course she is a pretty girl—"
"Too yellow—I mean too blondy," said Tom, feeling obliged to say something against Dorothy.