tal in Mr. Robert's desk, to the day of the concert,
when she got the bunch with his card tied to it.

"I'll admit it was takin' a chance," says I; "but you see, Miss Hampton,
when I was joshin' him as to whose picture it was he got so enthusiastic
in describin' you----"

"Did he, truly?" she cuts in.

"Unless I don't know a Romeo gaze when I see one," says I. "And then,
when I figures out that if you'd given him the chuck it might have been
through some mistaken notion, why--well, come to talk it over with Vee,
we thought----"

"Pardon me," says Miss Hampton, "but just who is Vee?"

"Eh?" says I, pinkin' up. "Why, in my case, she's the only girl."

"Ah-ha!" says she. "So you--er----"

"Uh-huh!" says I. "I've come near bein' ditched myself. And Mr. Robert
he's helped out more'n once. So this looked like my cue to hand back
something. We thought maybe the roses would kind of patch things up.
Say, how about it, Miss Hampton? Suppose he hadn't boobed it this way,
wouldn't there be a show of----"

"You absurd youth!" says she, liftin' both hands protestin', but failin'
to smother that smile.

And say, when it's aimed straight at you so you get the full benefit,
that's some winnin' smile of hers--sort of genuine and folksy, you know!
It got me. Why, I felt like I'd been put on her list of old friends. And
I grins back.

"It wa'n't a case of another party, was it?" says I.

She laughs and shakes her head.

"Or an old watch-dog aunt, eh?" I goes on.

"Whatever made you think of that?" says she.

"You ought to see the one that stands guard over Vee," says I. "But how
was it, anyway, that Mr. Robert got himself in wrong with you?"

"How?" says Miss Hampton, restin' her perky chin on one knuckle and
studyin' the rug pattern. "Why, I think it must have been--well, perhaps
it was my fault, after all. You see, when I left for Italy we were very
good friends. And over there it was all so new to me,--Italian life, our
villa hung on a mountainside overlooking that wonderful blue sea, the
people I met, everything,--I wrote to him, oh, pages and pages, about
all I did or saw. He must have been horribly bored reading them. I
didn't realize until--but there! We'll not go into that. I stopped,
that's all."

"Huh!" says I.

"So it's all over," says she. "Only, when I thought he had sent the
roses, of course I was pleased. But now that he has taken such pains to
prove that he didn't----"

She ends with a shoulder shrug