She had tried reasoning with the boy, had pointed out the fact that one is very often judged by the company one keeps, but Joe had refused to take her admonitions seriously.
“You talk as if I never went with anybody else, Dot,” he had said on one of these occasions. “And I never have anything to do with him except just when I happen to meet him. I can’t help saying hello when he talks to me.”
This argument had silenced Dorothy, and it had also almost convinced her that she had nothing to fear in that direction. Almost, but not quite, for Joe still was seen quite often in the company of Jack Popella.
To see this lad and question him was Dorothy’s one, all-absorbing desire just now. But to do this she must wait till the next day, and the hours stretched interminably between.
She flung herself into a chair, her chin cupped in her hand, staring moodily at the floor. Tavia came in and perched on the edge of the bed and regarded her chum curiously.
“Yes, I am human,” she said at last, in a mechanical tone. “I speak, I walk. If you were to pinch me I might shriek.”
Dorothy looked up with a frown. It was the first time she had noticed her chum’s presence in the room.
“What are you raving about?” she asked.
“I was merely trying to call your attention to the fact that I am human,” said Tavia patiently. “By the way you brushed past me in the hall, I assumed that you thought I was a chair, a bedstead, or even a humble hatrack.”
“Never a hatrack, Tavia dear,” replied Dorothy, smiling despite herself. “You are far too plump and pretty.”