Then as Polly flashed an indignant glance at him, attempting to pass as though she had neither seen nor recognized him, he added:
“I know I have no right to intrude upon you, but unless you are willing to give me some explanation of why you are here and what you are doing, I shall tell the friends who are nearer to you than I am of my having seen you not only this morning, but last night as well.”
“Oh, please don’t!” Polly’s voice was trembling. “Really, truly, I am not doing anything wrong in staying here in Boston and not letting people hear. My mother knows where I am and what I am doing and of course I am not alone. Yes, it was utterly silly and reckless of me to have peeped in at Esther’s dining-room window last night, but I was so dreadfully lonely and wanted to see everybody so much. How could I have dreamed that that wretched curtain would go banging away up in the air as it did? But anyhow, Mr. Hunt, I shall always be everlastingly grateful to you for not telling on me last night. I did not suppose you saw me and certainly never imagined you could have recognized me when I crouched down in the shadow.”
Unexpectedly Polly O’Neill laughed. “What a perfect idiot I should have looked if you had dragged me in before the dinner party like a spy or a thief or a beggar! I can just imagine Esther’s and Mollie’s expressions.”
“Yes, but all this is not quite to the point, Miss Polly,” Richard Hunt continued, speaking however in a more friendly tone. “Am I to tell Margaret Adams and Betty Ashton that I have discovered you, or will you take me into your secret and let me decide what is best to be done afterwards?”
“But you have not the right to do either the one thing nor the other,” the girl argued, lifting her veil for an instant in order to see if there was any sign of relenting in the face of her older friend.
There was not the slightest. And Polly recognized that for once in her life she was beaten.
“Don’t say anything today then, please,” she urged, looking into her pocketbook and finding there a card with a name and address written upon it. “But come to see me tomorrow if you like. And don’t think that I am ungrateful or—or horrid,” she ended abruptly, rushing away so swiftly that it would have been impossible for any one to have followed her without creating attention.
Rather grimly Richard Hunt gazed at the card he held in his hand. It bore a name that was not Polly O’Neill’s and the address of a quiet street in Boston. What on the face of the earth could she be doing? It was impossible to guess, and yet it was certainly nothing very unwise if her mother knew and approved of it.
Whether or not he had the right to find out, Richard Hunt had positively decided to take advantage of his recognition of Polly O’Neill and insist upon her confidence. He could not have explained even to himself why he was so determined on this course of action. However, it was true, as her friend Betty Ashton had insisted the night before, whether or not you happened to feel a liking for Polly, you were not apt to forget her.