"I will. Trot on, old man, and waylay Tony. I'll make a mess of things
sure as preaching if I run into her now."

Tony thought she had never known Dick to be so entertaining or talkative
as he was during that luncheon hour. He regaled her with all kinds of
newspaper yarns and related some of his own once semi-tragic but now
humorous misadventures of his early cub days. He talked, too, on current
events and world history, talked well, with the quiet poise and
assurance of the reader and thinker, the man who has kept his eyes and
ears open to life.

It was a revelation to Tony. For once their respective roles were
reversed, he the talker, she the listener.

"Goodness me, Dick!" she exclaimed during a pause in what had become
almost a monologue. "Why haven't you ever talked like this before? I
always thought I had to do it all and here you talk better than I ever
thought of doing because you have something to say and mine is just
chatter and nonsense."

He smiled at that.

"I love your chatter. But you are tired to-day and it is my turn. Do you
know what we are going to do after luncheon?"

"No, what?"

"We are going to take a canoe out on your Paradise and get into a shady
spot somewhere along the bank and you will lean back against a whole lot
of becoming cushions and put up that red parasol of yours so nobody but