"You're a trump, Elsie," he said, in his blunt, boyish way. "It takes a lot of pluck to get up and say a thing like that. Let's shake hands and be friends." And at that moment Elsie was happier than she had been in months.
"I think I'll just stop a minute to say good-night to Aunt Jessie," remarked Marjorie, as they were going up to their apartment in the lift. "I don't believe she has gone to bed yet if Dr. Randolph is spending the evening. Tell Aunt Julia I'll be right up, Elsie."
So Marjorie stepped out of the lift with the Randolphs, while Elsie went up another floor to her own apartment. Mrs. Randolph had insisted that Miss Graham should be her guest on leaving the hospital, and one of the most comfortable rooms in the apartment had been assigned to her.
It was Mrs. Randolph herself who opened the door for the young people; she was smiling, and looked as if she were pleased about something.
"Has Aunt Jessie gone to bed?" Marjorie asked.
"No, dear, she is in the parlor with Uncle George, and I think she wants to see you."
Barbara hurried her mother off to her room, to tell of the events of the evening, and Beverly followed, at a mysterious signal from Mrs. Randolph, so Marjorie was the only one to enter the cozy little parlor, where she found her aunt and the doctor sitting on the sofa side by side.
"I just came in for a minute to say good-night," she began. "I've had a lovely evening, and—and—" here Marjorie paused abruptly, struck by something unusual in the faces of her two listeners.
"Is—is anything the matter?" she inquired anxiously.
"Do we look as if there were?" inquired the doctor, and he smiled such a radiant smile that Marjorie's sudden anxiety melted into thin air.