ay
up ... Ha-ha--why, does the altitude make a difference? Maybe that's what
ails me, then-- That's awfully nice of you, man ... No, never mind
what my name is. Don't let's be ordinary. I'm just a voice from the
mountain top, and you're just a voice from the valley. So be it.... Without
an invitation? I only thanked you ..."

"Keep on," interjected Jack savagely, "and you'll have his wife
trailing you up with a gun!"

"Well--we'll see.... But do come sometime when you can--and bring your
wife! I'd love to meet some woman.... Oh, all right. Good-by."

With a gloved palm pressed hard over the mouthpiece she turned
reproachfully upon Jack. "Now you _did_ fix things, didn't you? Of
course, you knew I couldn't be nice to a man with a wife, so you had
to go and spoil everything. And I was just beginning to have a lovely
time!"

"Help yourself," Jack offered with heavy sarcasm. "Don't mind me at
all."

"Well, he wants to talk to you," she said. She put her lips again to
the mouthpiece and added a postscript. "Pardon me, but I held the line
a minute while I quarreled with your fireman. You're wrong--I don't
find him so nice to talk to. You may talk to him if you want to--I'm
sure you're welcome!" Whereupon she surrendered the receiver and
walked around the high, map-covered table, and amused herself by
playing an imaginary game of billiards with the pointer for a cue and
two little spruce cones which she took from her pocket for balls.

When Jack had finished talking and had hung up the receiver, he leaned
back against the shelf and watched her, his hands thrust deep into his
trousers pockets. He still scowled--but one got the impression that he
was holding that frown consciously and stubbornly and not because his
mood matched it.

Marion placed a cone at a point on the chart which was marked
Greenville, aimed for Spring Garden and landed the cone neatly in the
middle of Jack's belt.

"Missed the pocket a mile," he taunted grudgingly, hating to be
pleasant and yet helpless against the girl's perfect composure and
good humor.

"Give it back, and I'll try it again. There's a place called the
Pocket. I'll try that, for luck." Then she added carelessly--"What
would have happened, if you hadn't answered that man at all?"

"I'd have been canned, maybe."

"Forevermore." She pretended to chalk her cue with a tiny powder puff
which she took from a ridiculous vanity bag that swung from her belt.
"Wouldn't you kind of like