By Jove! And here she was sitting, calmly telling me all about it--just as she might to Jack--never thinking a thing about it! My, how charming, how innocent she was! But, dash it, that was the reason she was so beautiful--of course, that was it--and I had never seen anybody like her in all the world before. I knew jolly well I never should again, either. But I knew I ought to go--and at once. "I must cut along now," I thought; "infernal shame to be taking advantage of her this way!" And then I thought I would just wait a wee minute longer. Just then she turned toward me, her elbow on the arm of the wicker chair, her dainty, manicured finger-tips supporting her chin. "You know, Mr. Lightnut, I wasn't sure you would remember me at all," she said. "I was such a kid when you saw me last." "Oh, yes," I said, trying to recall the rather hoydenish children I had seen on the motor trip to Billings' home five years before. "I remember you were quite a little girl--weren't you?" I thought her face darkened a little; then her smile flashed through, like sunshine through a cloud. Her laugh came on top, like the mellow ripple of a tiny brook--that sort of thing--oh, you know! "Oh, I say now, Mr. Lightnut, cut out the josh," she remonstrated; and I thought she grew a little red. "No more for mine those sissy, girlie ways--I've got well over all of that!" She tossed one knee over the other and threw herself back in the chair. She seemed a little piqued. She went on: "I just tell you what--there's nothing like a couple of years off at college for toughening you! Gets all those mamma's baby ways out of you, you bet your life, and all the slushiness you get from trying to be like your sisters. Shucks!" I caught my breath. Of course, she had no idea how it sounded--this sort of talk; it was just her innocent frankness, her--what d'ye call it?--her _ingenuousness_--dash it! She continued musingly: "Gee, but I was soft when I first went away--a regular pie-faced angel-child!" Her voice had in it a sneer. Then she straightened up, whirled her chair facing me, and gave me a sounding slap on the knee. "Say, maybe the fellows I met didn't educate that out of me mighty quick! Well, I reckon yes!" And she nodded, eying me sidewise, her pretty chin in the air. But, dash me, I was so aghast I couldn't get out a word. Just sat there batting at her and turning hot and cold by turns. Came devilish near losing consciousness, by Jove, that's what! Of course, I knew she didn't know what she was talking about. Hadn't any sisters myself, don't you know, and never had learned much about other fellows' sisters; but, dash it, I knew something about _faces_, and I would have staked my life on hers. You can nearly always tell, you know. But, anyhow, I thought I had better go now. I got up. "I say, you want to just make yourself at home," I said. "And if you don't mind, I'll see you at the boat in the morning."