Page:Middle Aged Love Stories (IA middleagedlove00bacorich).djvu/281

 and these are her cookies, and no mistake. Who are you?”

Again she flushed, but more lightly.

“I am Miss Redding,” she said with a gentle dignity, “Mrs. Wilton’s sister.”

He stared at her vaguely.

“Mrs. Wilton—oh! you’re her sister? I didn’t know—” He stopped abruptly. As his confusion grew, her own faded away.

“You didn’t know she had one?” she asked, almost mischievously.

“I didn’t know you were here,” he recovered himself. “You’ve never been with Mrs. Dud before, have you?”

“No, not here when there was company,” she said.

He hardly noticed the words; his mind was groping among past histories.

“Her sister—her sister,” he muttered. “Why, then,” with an illuminating smile, “I used to go to school with you! I’m Tom Varian!”

She smiled and held out her hand.