ia
of sentiment and probability between the two halves of a formal
introduction.

"Oh, I'm very glad to meet you, Mr. Denham," she said, putting out her
hand--and he took and held it just long enough to realize that he really
was holding it, before she took it away to keep for her own again. "I've
often heard of you, and often wished I might know you."

"I'm awfully glad to hear you say that," he said, "and if I should have
the royal luck to be next to you at dinner, it doesn't seem to me that I
shall have the strength to keep from telling you why."

She clapped her hands at this, just as a very little girl might have done.

"If that is so, I hope that they will put you next to me at dinner," she
said gayly; "but if they don't, you'll tell me some other time, won't you?
I'm always _so_ interested in what people have to tell me about myself."

Burnett began to laugh.

"Jack," he said, "I see that we'd better have a clear and above-board
understanding right in the beginning and so I'll just tell you that this
sister of mine, who appears so guileless, is the very worst flirt ever.
She looks honest, but she can't tell the truth to save her neck. She means
well, but she drives folks to suicide just for fun. She'd do anything for
anybody in general, but when it's a case of you individually she won't do
a thing to you, and you must heed my words and be forewarned and forearmed
from now on. Mustn't he, Betty?"

At this the sister laughed, nodding quite as gayly as if it were a
laughing matter, instead of the opening move in a possibly
serious--tremendously serious--game of life.

"It's awful to have to subscribe to," she said, with dancing eyes; "but
I'm afraid it's true. I'm really quite a reprobate, and I admit it
frankly. And everyone is so good to me that I never get a chance to
reform. And so--and so--"

"But then, I suppose I ought to warn her about you, too," said Burnett,
turning suddenly toward his friend. "It isn't fair to show her up and not
show you up, you know. And really, Betty, he's almost as bad as you are
yourself. I may tell you in confidence--in strict confidence (for it's only
been in a few newspapers)--that he hasn't got his breach-of-promise suit
all compromised yet. Ask him to deny it, if he can!"

The sister looked suddenly startled and curious and Jack felt himself to
be blushing desperately.

"I don't look as if he was lying, do I?" he asked smiling; "be honest now,
for you can see that B