"But----'_amuse_'----" repeated Golden, blankly. "Does that stand for anything big?"
The soft Welsh voice of the other girl retorted, "It does, when you are working, and--and there isn't anything else. Isn't it natural that one likes the amusing people best? Mrs. Newton is amusing. Major Leefe doesn't mean to be, but he is. Mr. Ellerton is nice to go about with----"
Again Golden broke in gently. "Olwen! I don't like to hear you talk that way."
"Why not? Les Pins is over. And when a thing's over," pronounced this sage of twenty, "sensible people don't waste any more time on it."
"When you say that, it seems to me to be belittling a very----" Golden made the characteristic American pause after the adverb--"beautiful thing."
"It's different for you who have one man meaning the whole world to you. As I haven't. Well, I want to be amused, Golden."
More gently still Golden repeated, "I don't like to hear you talk that way, Olwen. Don't you feel any more that Captain Ross is different from the others?"
"I feel he's less amusing," declared the girl, walking beside her.
"And how," asked Golden, "does that young Mr. Ellerton 'amuse' you, then?"
"Well, he gives me a good time. I like being with him. He rattles away all the time. _He_ doesn't snap my head off----"
For half a minute there was silence as they walked along. Then Golden stopped by one of those dimly-gleaming lamps and peered down into her friend's small, mutinous face; her voice dropped a whole note as she said slowly:
"Olwen! You wouldn't do such a thing as play Mr. Ellerton off against Captain Ross to make Captain Ross jealous?"
"Oh, no," Olwen said quite honestly; forgetting something as entirely as a change of mood can cause one to forget. She had mischievously enough, allowed Captain Ross to go on thinking that the young R.N.A.S. officer had held her hand.... She didn't even care enough to remember it....
But at her answer the American girl heaved quite a sigh of relief. "Forgive me," she begged. "Forget I said that. I ought to have known it wasn't like you."
And here Olwen really felt herself humbled by the standards of the straight young goddess at her side. For the first time the younger, less womanly but more feminine and complex girl suffered a pang of remorse on account of a certain little Mr. Brown. Him she had certainly made use of at Les Pins to annoy Captain Ross. The blackberry time was not intentional; but that time on the terrace? Would Golden ever have talked to a young man "at" another young man? It would be better, she knew, if every girl could think and act like Golden ... it would be better.... But to every girl her problems.