Page:Arthur Stringer - Twin Tales.djvu/226

216 "I'm sorry," cried Conkling, nettling brick red as he rose to his feet with his hat in his hand. "I beg your pardon," he murmured again as he essayed a jackknife bow in which deference was not visibly shot through with mockery.

"I presume you are a stranger in this neighborhood," she said in an acridly condoning tone of voice.

"You are quite correct in that presumption," retorted Conkling, a little tired of being treated like an urchin caught in a cherry tree.

"Otherwise you would have respected the long-established wishes of the owner of this garden," concluded his enemy, with a glance at the No Trespassing sign.

"Undoubtedly, if I'd known in time," admitted the intruder.

The woman in the half mittens shifted her position a little.

"Since you paint, I suppose you are interested in paintings," she suggested.

Along that glacial frontier Conkling thought he detected certain surface