“Could you let me have ten dollars?” I said, in a faint tone.
He drew a long breath.
“Well, I guess yes,” he observed. “I thought you were going to touch me for a hundred, anyhow. I—I suppose you wouldn’t give me a kiss and call it square.”
I considered. Because after all, a kiss is not much, and ten dollars is a good deal. But at last my better nature won out.
“Certainly not,” I said coldly. “And if there is a String to it I do not want it.”
So he apologised, and came and sat beside me, without being a nusance, and asked me what my other troubles were.
“Carter,” I said, in a grave voice, “I know that you beleive me young and incapable of Afection. But you are wrong. I am of a most loving disposition.”
“Now see here, Bab,” he said. “Be fair. If I am not to hold your hand, or—or be what you call a nusance, don’t talk like this. I am but human,” he said, “and there is somthing about you lately that—well, go on with your story. Only, as I say, don’t try me to far.”
“It’s like this,” I explained. “Girls think they are cold and distant, and indeed, frequently are——”
“Frequently!”