"Brute!" said Miss Balou for the second time.
"Oh come now—"
"Do you know what I think about you?"
"What do you think?"
"I think you'd be lots of excitement at a house party," said Miss Vivi, shaking her head. "Just for a few days. I think you'd give a girl the grandest sort of a rush, but as for believing a word you said—never!"
"What do you mean?" said Skippy, immensely puffed up.
"It shows in your eyes," said Vivi with a look of having at last deciphered the mystery. "Besides, girls have spoiled you. You have had things too easily. No wonder you're conceited."
Miss Cantillon was discoursing brilliantly on a crow that had been struck by lightning in Oklahoma and had fallen into a wheat field and set fire to the grain, which had precipitated a conflagration which had necessitated calling out the fire departments of two counties.
"You're offended now," said Vivi in a contrite whisper.
"Some one's given you an awfully bad opinion of me," said Skippy stiffly, frowning to show the displeasure he did not feel.