rew the foot in to her and cried out. But not content
he reached for the other.

"If you take that off I'll never speak to you again," she cried. She
looked bewitching, struggling there in his arms all flushed and red,
with her hair coming down. He wanted to kiss her but he grabbed the
remaining slipper instead and firmly disengaged it from its place. And
then she began to cry. And as he held her, struggling no longer, with
one foot dangling disconsolately below his arm, he saw the turn of
shapely ankle all sleek in its sheathing of white silk, the high arch
with the delicate dip to the instep, and below it the gleam of two
pink toes boldly peeping from a malignant hole.

Contrite, he set her down while the audience went hysterical. He set
her down on a grassy mound and she threw him a red, angry look while
the traces of tears were quickly drying. And he noticed that the other
stocking was in the same condition. When he returned her the slippers
she put them on without a word.

The rest of the evening she spent on the rock beside Hawkins while
the two young swains made merry with the other girls and Miss Penny
simpered and Miss Ardle was correspondingly caustic. Joe sat back with
his head against a tree and a hard, tired smile about his mouth, and a
restlessness in the pit of his stomach. He tried not to look at Myrtle
and Hawkins. And once when the crowd surged in a moment's
boisterousness over to another part of the picnic grounds he stretched
himself, rubbed his eyes with the back of his hands to get the smart
out of them, and muttered, "God, what a party!" all to himself.

Later on, when they were gathering up the remains of the lunch and
folding it up in the tablecloth and returning glasses and plates and
cutlery to the basket, Joe found himself standing silently beside
Hawkins, watching the preparations for leaving. The moonlight was
streaming down in a silvery flood through the trees and the bit of
green meadow glowed like a fairy ring. There were silvery ripples on
the water of the little stream that slipped off with a tinkling
chatter into the deep gloom of the shadow. Somewhere near a wild
honeysuckle bloomed and the fragrance of its blooming came drifting to
them. Hawkins spoke. He stood with eyes fixed on the stooping figures
near the tablecloth and his lips barely moved.

"How'd you get mixed up in this crowd?" he said. It was a curious
question.

Joe looked at him oddly; the fellow's manner was, alw