Feeling better imediately, I got Sis out of the room and coaxed Hannah to bring me some dinner. While she was sneaking it out of the Pantrey I was dressing, and soon, as a new being, I was out on the stone bench at the foot of the lawn, gazing with wrapt eyes at the sea.
But Fate was against me. Eddie Perkins saw me there and came over. He had but recently been put in long trowsers, and those not his best ones but only white flannels. He was never sure of his garters, and was always looking to see if his socks were coming down. Well, he came over just as I was sure I saw Reginald Beecher next door on the veranda, and made himself a nusance right away, trying all sorts of kid tricks, such as snaping a rubber Band at me, and pulling out Hairpins.
But I felt that I must talk to somone. So I said:
“Eddie, if you had your choice of love or a Career, which would it be?”
“Why not both,” he said, hiching the rubber band onto one of his front teeth and playing on it. “Niether ought to take up all a fellow’s time. Say, listen to this! Talk about a eukelele!”
“A woman can never have both.”
He played a while, struming with one finger until the band sliped off and stung him on the lip.
“Once,” I said, “I dreamed of a Career. But I beleive love’s the most important.”
Well, I shall pass lightly over what followed. Why is it that a girl cannot speak of Love without every member of the Other Sex present, no matter how young, thinking it is he? And as for mother maintaining that I kissed that wreched Child, and they saw me from the drawing-room, it is not true and never was true. It was but one more Misunderstanding which convinced the Familey that I was carrying on all manner of afairs.
Carter Brooks had arrived that day, and was staying at the Perkins’ cottage. I got rid of the Perkins’ baby, as his Nose was bleeding—but I had not slaped him hard at all, and felt little or no compunction—when I heard Carter coming down the walk. He had called to see Leila, but she had gone to a beech dance and left him alone. He never paid any attention to me when she was around, and I recieved him cooly.