gree to be the
'best of friends,' and it reads so funny and flat. But that is exactly
what I am trying to put into words. It couldn't be anything more,
ever, and yet I want this friendship which is different from everything
I've ever known before. I like you very, very much. Listen, and I'll
make a confession, too! I used to watch and hope you'd come back,
after I'd sent you home, heart-sick, years ago. Do you suppose we
might say the--the 'best of friends' in real life, too, and not sound
instantly absurd?"

"We might try it out," he suggested.

Then she was positive that his face was too stiffly sober, but she
ignored it--ignored, too, the tinge of whimsicality in his voice.

"If I weren't so sorry for you I might not be so sure; but I am sorry.
If you weren't so dismayingly cheerful about it, I wouldn't feel so
badly. But I've begun to understand how very long you have been
playing your cards and smiling over them, no matter what might be dealt
you. And that is some improvement over the girl I've been, isn't it?
For I've never had to struggle very hard for anything I've wanted. I
want to be friends, but I'm not silly enough to think you won't tell me
again that you--care. I want to be friends, but not at the price of
your heart-ache and disappointment, and--why, I wonder, do I get all
tangled up when I try to explain myself to you? It's just this: I'm
not going to be unkind to little Steve any more, Mr. O'Mara, or--or big
Steve, either. But I--I want to see you sometimes, too, and--and I
just won't let myself cry any more this morning!"

Her voice had grown very small toward the end. It trailed off into a
stifled but unmistakable sniff. And a moment later, when she ceased
fumbling with the reins and glanced with resolute brightness up at him,
the film of hot tears in his eyes brought her hands to her throat. But
even then in the face of that light which she had never before glimpsed
in any man's eyes for her, she was conscious of his use of her
name--vaguely conscious of how different it sounded on his lips.

"Barbara," Steve faltered, "Barbara, you blessed child, you!" And
there, dumbly, he shook his head over his stumbling utterance and tried
to laugh to cover it. "Sorry? Sorry for me? Why, God bless you,
girl, you refuse me whenever you want to--whenever you have to! I'm
not asking you to help. And don't you suppose after last night I know
how near to losing out I am? I understand. Why,