"Fiddlesticks!"
"I state the condition as I found it. I happen to know that the girl possesses sufficient means to permit her to live at the Sawdust Pile for a year at least."
"But isn't she going away?" Mrs. McKaye's voice rose sharply. "Is she going to break her bargain?"
"Oh, I think not, Mrs. McKaye. She merely complained to me that somebody begged her to come back to Port Agnew; so she's waiting for somebody to come down to the Sawdust Pile and beg her to go away again. She's inclined to be capricious about it, too. One person isn't enough. She wants three people to call, and she insists that they be—ah—ladies!"
"Good gracious, Andrew, you don't mean it?"
"I am delivering a message, Mrs. McKaye."
"She must be spoofing you," Jane declared.
"Well, she laughed a good deal about it, Miss Jane, and confided to me that a bit of lurking devil in your sister's eyes the day you both met her in the telegraph office gave her the inspiration for this joke. She believes that she who laughs last laughs best."
Mrs. McKaye was consumed with virtuous indignation.
"The shameless hussy! Does she imagine for a moment that I will submit to blackmail, that my daughters or myself could afford to be seen calling upon her at the Sawdust Pile?"