"What d'you mean, Leslie?" demanded the other girl as they climbed the hill together. For the first time a look of austerity crossed Gwenna's small face. For the first time it seemed to her that the adored girl-chum was in the wrong. Yes! She had never before been shocked at Leslie, whatever wild thing she said. But now--now she was shocked. She was disappointed in her. She repeated, rebukefully, "What do you mean?"
"What," took up Leslie, defiantly, "do you think I meant?"
"Well--_did_ you mean make--make Mr. Dampier think other people liked me, and that I might like somebody else better than _him_?"
"Something of the sort _had_ crossed the mind of Leslie the Limit."
"Think not?" There was more than a hint of quarrel in both the girlish voices. Up to now they had never exchanged a word that was not of affection, of comradeship.
Gwenna, flushing deeper, said, "It's--it's _horrid_ of you, Leslie."
"Because it would be sort of _deceiving_ Mr. Dampier, for one thing. It's a _trick_."
"And not a pretty one, either," said little Gwenna, red and angry now. "It's--it's----"
"Well, it's what I should have thought that you yourself, Leslie, would have called '_so obvious_.'"
"Exactly," agreed Miss Long, with a flippant little laugh that covered smarting feelings. _Taffy_ had turned against her now! Taffy, who used to think that Leslie could do no wrong! This was what happened when one's inseparable chum fell in love....
Leslie said impenitently, "I've never yet found that '_the obvious thing_' was '_the unsuccessful thing_.' Especially when it comes to anything to do with young men. My good child, you and the Dampier boy, you
'_Really constitute a pair, Each being rather like an artless woodland elf._'
I mean, can't you see that the dear old-fashioned simple remedies and recipes remain the best? For a sore throat, black-currant tea. (Never fails!) For the hair, Macassar oil. (Unsurpassed since the Year Eighteen-dot!) For the stimulation of an admirer's interest, jealousy. Jealousy and competition, Taffy."
"He isn't an admirer," protested the younger girl, mollified. Then they smiled together. The cloud of the first squabble had passed.
Leslie said, "Never mind. If you don't approve of my specific, don't think of it again."