“I shall go back!”—with raised chin. How I remember that raised chin, and how (whisper it) I used to fear it!
“You cannot. I am holding the edge of your skirt.”
“Ralph! And all the other passengers looking!”
“Then sit down—and, before you do, tuck that rug under my feet, will you?”
“Certainly not.”
“Under my feet!”
She does it, under protest, whereon I release her skirts. She is sulky, quite distinctly sulky. I slide my hand under the rug into her lap. She ignores it.
“Now,” I say calmly, “we are even. And you might as well hold my hand. Every one thinks you are.”
She brings her hands hastily from under her rug and puts them over her head. “I don’t know what has got into you,” she says coldly. “And why are we even?”
“For the day you told me the deck was not clean.”