"That's all right, too," replied his friend, "but she's too smart to make a fool of herself over a married man like you. She'll let you run her around in your car and buy her a few nice little presents, but just as you think she's going to fall into your arms, she's going to step back and give you the laugh. I may be a fool, but that's the way it looks to me."
It was about the way it looked to him also, but he did not think it necessary to inform her of the fact, so to change the subject, and to kill time until the three o'clock appointment, he proposed lunching at Rector's, and she agreeing, they drove there in his car, and he, contrary to his usual custom, drank far more than was good for him.
Lola herself found time hanging heavily on her hands, and wandered aimlessly about the apartment waiting for her father and Dr. Crossett to return. Maria came to her at last, holding in her hand several letters, all but one of which she placed upon the table.
"Is that one for father?" said Lola, seeing her about to leave the room with one letter in her hand.
"No, Miss. It's for me." She hesitated for a moment, then went on shyly. "It's from Mr. Barnes!"
"Oh," remarked Lola curiously, "I thought he had stopped writing to you."
"I try to," replied Maria; "I manage to spell 'em out somehow."
"Why don't you ask me to read them for you?"
Maria did not reply for a moment, and turned once, as if to leave the room, but at last she seemed to make up her mind, and crossing to the couch on which Lola had languidly thrown herself, she said quietly, "I couldn't ask you while you were sick, and once, after we moved over here, I--I did, and you said you didn't want to be bothered. After that, some way I--I couldn't seem to bring myself to ask again. You see, I'm growing awful fond of Mr. Barnes, and--and I guess I'm sort of sensitive about him."
The poor girl said nothing of the hours she had studied, hopelessly confused, to spell out the crude little letters from the lover who meant so much to her, nor of the real delicacy that prevented her from asking anyone but the mistress she loved so deeply to read what he had written. To her Lola could do no wrong, and no man could hold any place in her heart that she would for a moment try to conceal from this girl who had brought the first glimpse of sunshine into her life.