She laughs and shakes her head.
"Or an old watch-dog aunt, eh?" I goes on.
"Whatever made you think of that?" says she.
"You ought to see the one that stands guard over Vee," says I. "But how was it, anyway, that Mr. Robert got himself in wrong with you?"
"How?" says Miss Hampton, restin' her perky chin on one knuckle and studyin' the rug pattern. "Why, I think it must have been—well, perhaps it was my fault, after all. You see, when I left for Italy we were very good friends. And over there it was all so new to me,—Italian life, our villa hung on a mountainside overlooking that wonderful blue sea, the people I met, everything,—I wrote to him, oh, pages and pages, about all I did or saw. He must have been horribly bored reading them. I didn't realize until—but there! We'll not go into that. I stopped, that's all."
"Huh!" says I.
"So it's all over," says she. "Only, when I thought he had sent the roses, of course I was pleased. But now that he has taken such pains to prove that he didn't——"
She ends with a shoulder shrug.
"Say, Miss Hampton," I breaks in, "you leave it to me."
"But there isn't anything to leave," says she, "not a shred! Sometime, though, I hope I may meet your Miss Vee. May I?"