To his immense surprise, Lily curved her white embroidered sleeve over her face and began to weep.
“What's the matter now?” asked Johnny, sulkily, after a minute.
“I think you are a real horrid boy,” sobbed Lily.
Lily looked like nothing but a very frilly, sweet, white flower. Johnny could not see her face. There was nothing to be seen except that delicate fluff of white, supported on dainty white-socked, white-slippered limbs.
“Say,” said Johnny.
“You are real cruel, when I—I saved your—li-fe,” wailed Lily.
“Say,” said Johnny, “maybe if I don't see any other girl I like better I will marry you when I am grown up, but I won't if you don't stop that howling.”
Lily stopped immediately. She peeped at him, a blue peep from under the flopping, embroidered brim of her hat. “Are you in earnest?” She smiled faintly. Her blue eyes, wet with tears, were lovely; so was her hesitating smile.
“Yes, if you don't act silly,” said Johnny. “Now you had better run home, or your mother will wonder where that baby-carriage is.”
Lily walked away, smiling over her shoulder, the smile of the happily subjugated. “I won't tell anybody, Johnny,” she called back in her flute-like voice.