natural for Sally to stop and speak to Joe, if she wanted to; Joe
had been a familiar figure in their lives since they were children.
But--

But Sally was laughing and panting in a manner new and
incomprehensible. She caught Martie by both hands. All three, young
and not understanding themselves or life, stood laughing a little
vaguely in the sharp winter dusk. Joe was a mighty blond giant, only
Martie's age, and younger, except in inches and in sinews, than his
years. He had a sweet, simple face, rough, yellow hair, and hairy,
red, clumsy hands. A greater contrast to gentle little Sally, with
her timid brown eyes and the bloodless quiet of manner that was like
her mother and like Lydia, could hardly have been imagined.

"Where've you been?" Martie asked.

"We've been to church!" dimpled Sally with a glance at Joe.

The pronoun startled Martie.

"We were up in the organ loft," Joe contributed with his half-
laughing, half-nervous grin.

Still bewildered, Martie followed her sister into the dark garden,
after a good-night nod to Joe, and went into the house. Their father
reluctantly accepted the girls' separate accounts of the afternoon:
Sally had been in church, Martie had driven about with Rod and had
gone to tea at his house. Lydia fluttered with questions. Who was
there? What was said? Malcolm asked Martie where Rodney had left
her.