ich entirely benevolent speech, Arnold returned nothing but
the uneasy shrug and resentful look of one baffled by a hostile
demonstration too subtle for his powers of self-defense. He picked up
the chair he had thrown over, and waited sulkily till the others were
in the high-ceilinged living-room before he joined them. Then when
Morrison, in answer to a request from his hostess and old friend, sat
down to the piano and began to play a piece of modern, plaintive, very
wandering and chromatic music, the younger man drew Sylvia out on the
wide, moon-lighted veranda.

"Morrison is the very devil for making you want to punch his head, and
yet not giving you a decent excuse. I declare, Sylvia, I don't know
but that what I like best of all about you is the way you steer clear
of him. He's opening up on you too. Maybe you didn't happen to notice
... at the dinner-table? It wasn't much, but I spotted it for a
beginning. I know old Felix, a few." Sylvia felt uneasy at the
recurrence of this topic, and cast about for something to turn the
conversation. "Oh, Arnold," she began, rather at random, "whatever
became of Professor Saunders? I've thought about him several times
since I've been here, but I've forgotten to ask you or Tantine. He was
my little-girl admiration, you know."

Arnold smoked for a moment before answering. Then, "Well, I wouldn't
ask Madrina about him, if I were you. He's not one of her successes.
He wouldn't stay put."

Sylvia scented something uncomfortable, and regretted having
introduced the subject.

Arnold added thoughtfully, looking hard at the ash of his cigarette,
"I guess Madrina was pretty bad medicine for Saunders, all right."

Sylvia shivered a little and drew back, but she instantly put the
matter out of her mind with a trained and definite action of her will.
It was probably "horrid"; nothing could be done about it now; what
else could they talk about that would be cheerful? This was a
thought-sequence very familiar to Sylvia, through which she passed
with rapid ease.

Arnold made a fresh start by offering her his cigarette-box. "Have
one," he invited her, sociably.

She shook her head.

"Oh, all the girls do," he urged her.

Sylvia laughed. "I may be a fresh breeze from beyond the Mississippi,
but I'm not so fresh as to think it's wicked for a girl to smoke. In
fact I like to, myself, but I can't stand the dirty taste in my mouth
the next morning. Smoking's not worth it."

"_Well_ ..."