"Competition is the soul of trade. If I can give the poor souls an
idea that other men want me--quite flaunt them, you know--they all
come bounding up to want me, too. It's very cheering, don't you
think, to have a faithful hound or so about?"
Fortunately the teacher was called away by the exigencies of her
part, just at that moment. Joy, who was not easily shocked by Gail,
having spent nearly four weeks in her immediate vicinity now,
lingered. She had an inquiring mind.
"Do you think that really is true, Gail, or were you just trying to
shock Miss Archinard?" she asked.
Gail laughed, her peculiar short, low laugh, that, like everything
she said and did, had something a little mocking in it. It was
curiously at variance with her boyishness. You could not say she was
masculine, but there was a something stripped away from her which
most people class as feminineness. Joy wondered if it was softness
she missed--pity, perhaps, or tenderness. She was, at least, brilliant
to the last degree when she talked, though it was a perfectly useless
brilliance. Gail's life had no other end than amusing herself with
whatever persons or things came her way. If they could be laughed
at or employed in her service that was all she wanted.
"Shocking Miss Archinard is a pathetic sort of performance," said
Gail. "Any child can do it. You doubtless do yourself. Joy, she
probably thinks your coloring too vivid for ladylikeness.
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