about it."

"Oh, I can see! If you'd noticed the poor fellow's face--"

"'Poor fellow!' If you'd seen him before you came! He doesn't need your
pity. Why, it seems to have been with you a case of love at first sight,"
I said mockingly. "He was rude to you, too; he never even noticed that you
were in the room, after I came."

"I don't care. I don't expect a man to notice me when he meets his
sweetheart for the first time in ever so long; and such a sweetheart! But
you--you--oh, I'm afraid of you! I'm afraid of you! What is this mystery?
What is it? Why have you grown so grand and terrible? What has become of
my chum?"

She sat down flat on the floor and burst into passionate weeping.

"Get up!" I cried.

"I won't!"

A sense of great loneliness came over me and I threw myself down beside
her.

"Oh, Kitty," I said, "why aren't you old and wise and sensible instead of
being just a silly girl like myself? Then you wouldn't sit here howling,
but you'd kiss me and cuddle me and comfort me and tell me what to do."

"I'm afraid of you! I'm afraid of you! It's--it's no' canny."