"And what of 'Dora'?"
"He can go back to Dora Cowper then. I'll tell him I was only 'pulling his leg,' like he said about her. It will do him good."
"You might break his heart," I said with mock compassion.
"Break his heart! His heart! He's got the sort of heart to be compensated by a good plate of roast-beef and plum-pudding—like a good many more!"
"Will he consent to this?"
"He'll have to or do the other thing; he can please himself which. I don't care a hang. He said that if I would marry him soon he would let me continue the singing lessons and get me a lovely piano,—all the soft-soap men always give a girl beforehand. I wonder did he think me one of the folks who would swallow it? Couldn't I see as soon as I was married all the privileges I would get would be to settle down and drudge all the time till I was broken down and telling the same hair-lifting tales against marriage as aired by every other married woman one meets;" and Dawn, her cheeks flushed and her white teeth gleaming between her pretty lips, looked the personification of furious irritation.
"All I care for now is to get the singing lessons, as long as I don't have to do anything too bad to get them."
I suddenly turned on her and asked—
"Honestly, why did you throw that dish of water on Ernest Breslaw?" Thus unexpectedly attacked, her answer slipped out before she had time to prevaricate.
"Because I was a mad-headed silly fool—the biggest idiot that ever walked. That's why I did it!"