up and a smolderin' glow in them
gray eyes of hers.

If it hadn't been for puttin' myself in the quitter class I'd laid off
Sunday night. But I just couldn't do that. So we stands another siege.
No use tryin' to describe it. Cousin Myra's tactics are too sleuthy.
Just one jab after another, with them darnin'-needle eyes addin' the fine
touches.

But this time Vee only smiles back at her and never answers once. Why,
even Auntie takes up a couple of Myra's little slams and debates the
point with her enthusiastic. Nothing from Vee, though. I don't
understand it a bit until it's all over, and Vee follows me out into the
hall and helps me find my hat. Quite careless, she shuts the door behind
us.

"Whew!" says I. "Some grouch, Cousin Myra! What is it--shootin' pains
in the disposition?"

Vee snickers. "Did you mind very much, Torchy?" she asks.

"Me?" says I. "Oh, I was brought up on roasts--never knew much else.
But, I must say, I was gettin' a bit hot on your account."

"Don't," says she. "You see, I know all about Cousin Myra--why she's
like that, I mean."

"On a diet of mixed pickles and sour milk, is she?" says I--"or what?"

No, it wasn't anything so simple as that. It was a case of a romance
that got ditched. Seems that Myra'd been engaged once. No idle seashore
snap runnin' from Fourth of July to Labor Day, but a long-winded,
year-to-year affair. The party of the second part was one Hinckley, a
young highbrow who knew so much that it took the college faculty a long
time to discover that he was worth more'n an assistant bartender and
almost as much as a fourth-rate movie actor. Then, too, Myra's father
had something lingerin' the matter with him, and wouldn't let anybody
manage him but her. Hymen hobbled by both hind feet, as you might say.

They was keepin' at it well, though, each bearin' up patient and waitin'
for the happy day, when Myra's younger sister came home from
boardin'-school and begun her campaign by practisin' on the Professor,
just because he happened to be handy. She was a sweet young thing with
cheek dimples and a trilly laugh, and--well, you can guess the rest.
Only, when little sister has made a complete hash of things, she skips
merrily off and marries a prominent 'varsity quarter-back who has water
on the knee and the promise of a nine-dollar-a-week job in uncle's stove
works.

Course, Myra really should have made it up when Professor Hinckley
finally does come cra