"There is! You're awfully depressed." "I'm used to that." "But why? Come now, you've got to tell me!" Flora dropped her head on her arms and began to cry. "Flora! Flora! What shall I do with you? You are so silly!" The woman sat up and wiped her eyes. The little hysterical outburst evidently relieved her; she smiled, though her lips still trembled. "I was tellin' my fortune to see what kind of a letter I'd git to-morrow mornin' from my friend about goin' to the movies. I like 'em, but 'pears he ain't stuck on 'em. An'--an', I'm bettin' he'll say he won't go. The cards make out I ain't goin' to have no luck." "Nonsense! You've got too much sense to believe in cards." "Miss Freddy, Mr. Maitland'll think the house real pretty the way you fixed up them leaves. Some of 'em is as handsome as if they was hand-painted!" Fred preserved a grave face, and said yes, the leaves were lovely. "An' he's comin' out to-morrow night?" Flora said, nodding her head. "Well, I guess _you're_ happy." Her opaque black eyes gleamed with unshed tears. Frederica, rising, put an impulsive arm around her; Flora suddenly sobbed on her shoulder. "Is it because your beau has been unkind?" Fred said. She used Flora's own vernacular. "I 'ain't never had a real beau. Oh, well, I don't care! I'm glad you got a beau, anyhow." "I don't know that I have," Fred said, smiling. "But you'll get one some day." Under her friendly words was a good-natured contempt--Flora was so anxious for a "beau"! "An' your gentleman'll come out here to-morrow night," Flora repeated,--it was as if she turned the knife in her own wound; "an' you and him'll set in the living-room. And you'll talk. And he'll talk. An' he'll ... kiss you." "Oh," Fred said, laughing, "Mr. Maitland and I are not interested in _that_ kind of thing! We are trying to give women the vote, and to make the world better--that's what we are going to talk about. And, Flora, remember, you've got to give us an awfully good supper! Come, now! you're tired. You really must go to bed." She laid a gently compelling hand on the frail shoulder, and Flora, sighing miserably, took the lamp from its bracket and followed Miss Freddy up-stairs to the cubby-hole under the roof where she slept. CHAPTER XVIII The next day it rained and the little house was dark and damp. Across the sodden beach-grass Fred and Flora could see the fat woman in the next bungalow moving her trunks and her paralyzed husband back to town; when they had gone, the owner of the bungalow came to give a look around and see how much damage his tenants had done. Then he closed the shutters and boarded up the front door. By noon the sound of his hammering ceased, and the shore, with its huddle of cottages, was entirely deserted. The only human sign was the wisp of smoke from Fred's chimney. All the morning it rained heavily. At ten o'clock Flora put on her things and walked nearly a mile to the post-office. She came back soaking-wet, and empty-handed.