Page:Conflict (1927).pdf/270

 'All right. By the way, you going to be at home, by any chance, late this afternoon?'

'Oh, I am sorry. I'm afraid I'

'Oh, well, never mind. I just wanted to leave something of yours I have.'

'Why, I haven't missed anything. It can't be of any importance. Don't bother, please.'

'It's no bother. I'll drop around with it, somewhere around four-thirty this afternoon, and if you're not there, why, I'll just leave it at the door.'

'Oh, please don't. Really I'

'You don't have to stay at home for me.'

'I know. But'

'I'll be there. Good-bye.'

'But you don't know where I live.'

'Oh, don't I?' he retorted, and then in a low confidential tone he added, 'I like the ruffled curtains, better than the plain ones.'

Sheilah had been experimenting with new curtains in her front room this last week.

'You do!' she gasped.

'Yes,' he went on ingenuously, as if unaware that he had said anything incriminating. 'I think ruffles jollier somehow, at least from the outside. I'll tell you what I think from inside this afternoon, if you're there.'

'But I'

'That's all right,' he interrupted. He simply