times!" she said, with sweet reproach--"didn't know we were
married!--she wasn't a Fern Hill girl. She told me she had been
dancing with my 'nephew.'"

"Did she?... Eleanor, look at that elm tree, standing all alone in the
field, like--like a wineglass full of summer!"

For a moment she didn't understand his readiness to change the
subject--then she had a flash of instinct: "I believe she said the
same thing to you!"

"Oh, she got off some fool thing." The annoyance in his voice was like
a rapier thrust of certainty.

"I knew it! But I don't care. Why should I care?"

"You shouldn't. Besides, it was only funny. I was tremendously amused."

She turned and looked out of the window.

Maurice lifted the paper which had been such a convenient shelter for
clasping hands, and seemed to read for a while. Then he said, abruptly,
"I only thought it was funny for her to make such a mistake."

She was silent.

"Eleanor, don't be--that way!"

"What 'way'? You mean"--her voice trembled--"feel hurt to have you dance
_three times_, with a girl who said an uncomplimentary thing about me?"