"That's very nice," she said, still tapping the floor and looking past him into the night. "Industry is always an excuse for any one. But, come to think of it, you were very good in showing them about at the ball. I appreciate it, I'm sure." It was of his conduct at the ball that he wished to speak; she knew it, and tried to make it hard for him. "See here, Evelyn, you know well enough why I kept away from you that night. I told you before the ball that I didn't,--well, I didn't like it! If I hadn't cared a whole lot it wouldn't have made any difference--but that show was so tawdry and hideous--" Evelyn readjusted her cape and sat down on the veranda railing. "Oh, I was tawdry, was I?" she asked, sweetly. "I knew some one would tell me the real truth about it if I waited." "I didn't come here to have you make fun of me," he said, bitterly. He imagined that since the ball he had been suffering a kind of martyrdom. Evelyn could not help laughing. "Poor Warry!" she exclaimed in mock sympathy. "What a hard time you make yourself have! Just listen to Mr. Foster laughing on the other side of the porch; it must be much cheerfuller over there." Mr. Foster was the young man from Keokuk; he wore a secret society pin in his cravat, and Warry hated him particularly. "What an ass that fellow is!" he blurted, savagely. He had just lighted a fresh cigarette, and threw away the stump of the discarded one with an unnecessary exercise of strength. "But he's cheerful, and has very nice manners!" said Evelyn. Warry was still looking away from her petulantly. Her attitude toward him just now was that of an older sister toward a young offending brother. He felt that the interview lacked dignity on his side, and he swung around suddenly. "You know we can't go on this way. You know I wouldn't offend you for anything in the world,--that if I've been churlish it's simply because I care a great deal; because it has hurt me to find you getting mixed up with the wrong people. If you knew what your coming home meant to me, how much I've been counting on it! and then to find that you wouldn't meet me on our old friendly basis, and didn't want any suggestions from me." He had, almost unconsciously, been expecting her to interrupt him; but she did not do so, and left him to flounder along as best he could. When he paused helplessly, she said, still like a forbearing sister: