“It seems so easy to me,” Felicia murmured, “to say ‘I’m jealous’—just two little words like that——”
And the dull other fellow inside me had kept me awake nights inventing long-winded lectures for me, when all I needed to say was two little words. But a groan burst from him, and he made me say it.
“But, O Felicia,” my unwilling lips repeated, “those two words are the hardest words in the whole language.” For by the light of Felicia’s words I had found him out, the hypocrite. He had been jealous all along.
Felicia looked at me with curiosity.
“I suppose they would be hard words to say if one really felt them,” she said comprehendingly.
“But I’m not jealous!” I longed to shout, but before we could say anything further, Monty Saunders and a girl danced past us.
“So you brought it off?” said Lydia, looking after the receding pair.
“How did you know?” Felicia demanded.
“He told her,” explained little Cecilia Bennett, “when Lydia asked him how you could stand him around so much, he told her you were helping him out with Mildred—telling him what to do and keeping his courage up. He told me, too,” pursued Cecilia, with the importance one naturally feels when one is in the thick of the battle of life. “He says it’s awful to see a 482 proposal before you, and the only way really is to stumble on it before you know you’ve made up your mind.”
“Poor boy,” remarked Lydia. “I should find Mildred formidable myself. Six feet and muscle!”