"Dear Phyllis!" she thought, with a gush of gratitude in her heart
that there was one person in the world so unfailingly thoughtful and
honest and dependable. The world did not quite go down in ruins
while Phyllis stood her friend.
"Dear Phyllis!" she heard John's gay voice say, as if in echo of her
own thoughts. "She knew I'd want a chance to see you alone a
minute.... What an awful amount of people too many there are in the
world, aren't there, kiddie? I'm beginning to think with yearning of
Crusoe's isle, and a barbed-wire fence around that."
He drew her into the shadow of the vines on the porch, and took her
in his arms. ... And he had told Gail ... oh, how _could_ men?
For a moment she stood, passive. Then the nearness of him, and the
cruel last-timeness of it all, swept over her again, and she threw
her arms around his neck convulsively, and kissed him over and over
again. She wanted it to remember.
"Good-by, my dearest!" she whispered.
"Not good-by, dear--good-night!" he answered her. "It's a long time
till tomorrow, but thank goodness, it's coming. And all the
tomorrows after that."
"No--" she started to say, when she heard footsteps, and John
released her.
"It's a very dark night," said Allan sadly. "I couldn't see my best
friend, even if he were on my own porch. Coming in, John?"
"Allan, you have the tact of Talleyrand, or whoever it was they used
to kick," responded John amiably.
Pages:
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253