“Yes, I am; but how should I know?” Rex said, “I, who have no sisters nor mother nor near female relation, and have scarcely been near a girl until this summer. Do they all—does the little one wear false hair?”
“No, sir!” Tom answered promptly. “Many girls do wear it, though. There is no harm in it that I see. No girl has as much hair of her own as Irene wears. You might know that with half an eye; but come on and change your wet clothes, and not stand there staring at this hair as if it were a live thing.”
“Yes,” Rex stammered, “but what shall we do with it?”
“Do with it?” Tom repeated. “Give it to Irene, of course. It is valuable. False braids like this cost money.”
“But,” Rex began again. “Will she like to know that—that we know it? Won’t it mortify her? Hadn’t we better throw it into the sea and say nothing? That will save her feelings. She’ll think she lost it there.”
“Rex, you are a gentleman, if you don’t know anything! I should never have thought of sparing Irene that way,” Tom said, tossing the hair far out to meet an incoming wave which when it receded carried with it Irene’s heaviest and most expensive braid which had given way under Rex’s firm grasp.
“Yes, that’s better than telling her,” Rex said, standing a moment and watching the hair as it drifted further and further away until it was lost to view. “Yes, better be there than on her head; but I’ll confess I am surprised. I have a great deal to learn about girls. Yes, a great deal, and I don’t like it,” was the last Tom heard as they separated at the door of Rex’s bath-room.
When alone, Tom bent himself double to smother his laughter, while saying to himself:
“I’d like nothing better than to see Irene’s face when Rex gave her back her hair, if he had done so; but then I’m a brute and Rex is a gentleman through and through, but a good deal of a simpleton. I believe, though, I’d be as big a one, to have his kindness of heart and delicacy of feeling which prompted him not to mortify Irene needlessly.”
Meanwhile Irene had dried and dressed herself and was sitting out in the sunshine, with little thrills of delight in her heart as she thought that Rex had saved her. Just how or where he had seized her she did not know, she was so frightened; by her arm, most likely, and she was waiting for him to appear and thinking what she should say to thank him, when Rena came to her side, bringing her hat and umbrella. In the excitement of caring for her cousin she had not noticed her hair, but she did now, and exclaimed: