ant to eat out there with us?"

Josephine hesitated for two seconds. "All right," she consented then, in
a supremely indifferent tone which was of course quite wasted on Buddy,
who immediately disappeared with a whoop.

"Come on, dad--she says yes, all right, she'll come," he announced
gleefully. Buddy was Josephine's devoted admirer, at this point in their
rather brief acquaintance; which, according to his mother's well-known
theory, was convincing proof of her intrinsic worth--Mrs. Kate having
frequently strengthened her championship of Ford to his detractor, Miss
Josephine, by pointing out that Buddy was fond of him.

Josephine spent the brief interval in tucking back locks of hair and in
rearranging the folds of her long, Japanese kimono, and managed to fall
into a languidly indifferent attitude by the time Chester opened the
door. Behind him came Ford; Miss Josephine moved her lips and tilted her
head in a perfunctory greeting, and afterward gave him no more
attention than if he had been a Pullman porter assisting with her
suitcases. For the matter of that, she gave quite as much attention as
she received from him--and Mason's lips twitched betrayingly at the
spectacle.

Through dinner they seemed mutually agreed upon ignoring each other as
much as was politely possible, which caused Mason to watch them with
amusement, and afterwards relieve his feelings by talking about them to
Kate in the kitchen.

"Gosh! Jo and Ford are sure putting up a good bluff," he chuckled, while
he selected the freshest dish towel from the rack behind the pantry
door. "They'd be sticking out their tongues at each other if they was
twenty years younger; pity they ain't, too; it would be a relief to 'em
both!"

"Phenie provokes me almost past endurance!" Mrs. Kate complained,
burying two plump forearms in a dishpan of sudsy hot water, and bringing
up a handful of silver. "It's because Ford had been fighting when he
came here, and she knows he has been slightly addicted to liquor. She
looks down on him, and I don't think it's fair. If a man wants to
reform, I believe in helping him instead of pushing him father down."
(Mrs. Kate had certain little peculiarities of speech; one was an
italicized delivery, and another was the omission of an r now and then.
She always said "father" when she really meant "farther.") "There's a
lot that one can do to help. I believe in showing trust and confidence
in a man, when he's trying to live down pas