He seemed to be as willing to talk to Polly as he had to Bettina on their first meeting. But then Bettina was beside them, listening with the soft color coming in her cheeks from her deep interest, and the blue in her sometimes gray eyes.
She had been sitting with Mrs. Burton and separated from the others when the young Indian joined them. It was extraordinary how soon they were surrounded.
First Peggy came and took a seat across from her aunt and then Alice Ashton, intending to make a special study of Indian custom, therefore felt it her duty to make the young man’s acquaintance. Ellen Deal frankly leaned over from her place on the opposite side of the aisle and Gerry came and stood beside Bettina. Only Vera and Sallie Ashton appeared uninterested. Vera, because she was too shut up inside herself to be natural; and Sallie, because she was too much entertained by a light novel and a five-pound box of chocolates, into which she had been dipping steadily for several days without the least injury to her disposition or her complexion.
When the young Indian sat down she had simply given him a glance from over the pages of her book and then glanced at Bettina. Afterwards she had smiled and gone on reading. Sally and Bettina knew each other, of course, though not intimately, considering the fact that their mothers were sisters. But then they only met now and then and there was no congeniality between them. Alice and Bettina were better friends.
“Gerry Williams and Bettina looked a little alike,” Mrs. Burton reflected, even while she was listening with interest to the conversation of their new acquaintance. But then it had become second nature to study the girls traveling with her ever since their departure.
“Gerry was perhaps prettier than Bettina, or at least some people might think so,” Polly decided, feeling that in some way the idea was a disloyalty to her own friendship with Bettina’s mother. And certainly Gerry was easier to understand!
She was standing now beside Bettina, her eyes a lighter blue, her hair a paler gold, but she was about the same in height and slenderness. And she was talking to the young Indian as if they had known each other a long time, while Bettina, now that other people were present, remained silent.
“Do you mean to be a chief yourself some day?” Gerry asked, her blue eyes widening like a child’s from curiosity.
Gerry was a pretty contrast to the young Indian; so delicately fair in comparison with his bronze vigor.
She looked almost poorly dressed as she stood by Bettina, but girls do not realize that handsome clothes are not necessary when one is pretty and young. Gerry’s traveling dress was also blue, a brighter color, and equally becoming. Just for half an instant, and before the young man answered, it flashed through Polly Burton’s mind that the young Indian might become interested in Gerry if they should chance to meet often. And Gerry had not the social training to make her realize how wrong it might be to cultivate such a friendship. The next instant, however, Mrs. Burton had forgotten the absurdity of her own idea. Besides, in all probability they would not see the young man again.