“Oh, well,” observed Garrison, “I dare say any number of girls loved Billy Garrison. Popular idol, you know----”
“I dare say,” she echoed dryly. “Possibly the dark, clinging kind.”
He eyed her wonderingly, but she was looking very innocently at the peregrinating chipmunk.
“And it was so funny,” she ran on, as if she had not heard his observation nor made one herself. “Coming home in the train from the Aqueduct the evening of the handicap, father left me for a moment to go into the smoking-car. And who do you think should be sitting opposite me, two seats ahead, but--Who do you think?” Again she turned and held his eyes.
“Why--some long-lost girl-chum, I suppose,” said Garrison candidly.
She laughed; a laugh that died and was reborn and died again in a throaty gurgle. “Why, no, it was Billy Garrison himself. And I was being annoyed by a beast of a man, when Mr. Garrison got up, ordered the beast out of the seat beside me, and occupied it himself, saying it was his. It was done so beautifully. And he did not try to take advantage of his courtesy in the least. And then guess what happened.” Still her eyes held his.
“Why,” answered Garrison vaguely, “er--let me see. It seems as if I had heard of that before somewhere. Let me see. Probably it got into the papers--No, I cannot remember. It has gone. I have forgotten. And what did happen next?”
“Why, father returned, saw Mr. Garrison raise his hat in answer to my thanks, and, thinking he had tried to scrape an acquaintance with me, threw him out of the seat. He did not recognize him.”
“That must have been a little bit tough on Garrison, eh?” laughed Garrison idly. “Now that you mention it, it seems as if I had heard it.”
“I've always wanted to apologize to Mr. Garrison, though I do not know him--he does not know me,” said the girl softly, pleating the gelding's mane at a great rate. “It was all a mistake, of course. I wonder--I wonder if--if he held it against me!”
“Oh, very likely he's forgotten all about it long ago,” said Garrison cheerfully.
She bit her lip and was silent. “I wonder,” she resumed, at length, “if he would like me to apologize and thank him--” She broke off, glancing at him shyly.
“Oh, well, you never met him again, did you?” asked Garrison. “So what does it matter? Merely an incident.”