"
I had hardly got the words out, when I saw that they were not making
the hit I had anticipated. She looked at me with an expression of
absolute scorn, don't you know.
"Well, really, Reggie," she said at last, "I never have had a very high
opinion of your intelligence, as you know, but this is a revelation to
me. What motive you can have had, unless you did it in a spirit of pure
mischief----" She stopped, and there was a glare of undiluted repulsion
in her eyes. "Reggie! I can't believe it! Of all the things I loathe
most, a practical joker is the worst. Do you mean to tell me you did
all this as a practical joke?"
"Great Scott, no! It was like this----"
I paused for a bare second to collect my thoughts, so as to put the
thing clearly to her. I might have known what would happen. She dashed
right in and collared the conversation.
"Well, never mind. As it happens, there is no harm done. Quite the
reverse, in fact. Hilda left a note for Harold telling him what she had
done and where she had gone and why she had gone, and Harold found it.
The result was that, after Hilda had been with me for some time, in he
came in a panic and absolutely grovelled before the dear child. It
seems incredible but he had apparently had no notion that his absurd
behavior had met with anything but approval from Hilda.
Pages:
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173