I imagine that Margaret perceived, from the expression of my countenance, that she had gone a little too far; because she said, in quite a different tone of voice,--
"Never mind about shoes! play in those you have on, and I'll tell Jackson to give the lawn an extra roll in the morning."
If I had been wise I should have taken the reference to Jackson as a hint, and slipped out of playing. But my back was a wee bit up, and I was a little off my balance, so I played. Of course I made a frightful spectacle of myself. It did make me so wild.
Bertha and Margaret said they would play Miss Reeves and me, which I did not like, to begin with. Under the circumstances, I felt that one of them might have offered to take me as a partner. They might have seen that I was commencing to regard Miss Reeves as if she were covered with prickles. Besides which, considering what I imagined I had come there for, and the position which I was shortly to occupy in the family, it did seem to me that they ought not to have paired me with a stranger. But as they evidently preferred to play together, they plainly did not think it worth their while to study my tastes for a moment. So I was as sugary to Miss Reeves as I could be.
"I am afraid you have a very bad partner," I observed.
"I don't mind," she was kind enough to reply. "I expect you're one of those dark horses who're better than they choose to make out."
I tried to be, but I failed ignominiously. I do declare that I am not always so bad as I was then. But, as I have said, I was a little off my balance; and all I could do was make an idiot of myself. Bertha served first; my partner suggested I should take her service. I took it, or rather, I didn't take it. She sent the balls so fast that I could scarcely see them; and then there was such a twist on them, or whatever you call the thing, that I could not have hit them anyhow. I did not hit them, not one.
"What horrid balls," I murmured, when Bertha had made an end.
"You seem to find them so."
My partner spoke with such excessive dryness that I could have hit her with my racket. When it came to her turn to serve she asked me a question.