Page:The Star in the Window.pdf/208

198 nothing else to enjoy, and he certainly had nothing else to-night.

"Nonsense," he laughed. "Didn't you help me the other night?" He recalled now the vivid blush of that occasion. "I wouldn't have tried to lift one of those two-hundred pounders for a good deal," he smiled, looking straight at Reba and forcing the blush that was but a faint one, so far, to a deep rose. "You must let me reciprocate a little, after such a service. Come, let's lock up, or whatever it is you have to do. And then you must let me take you wherever you want to go. I've my car at the door."

Reba swept him another flickering glance. How like he was to the young god in the white flannels who had asked her to go sailing so many years ago, standing before her like this, offering to take her in his car somewhere—she wasn't quite sure where—in such chivalrous fashion, tossing away whole cigarettes out of politeness to her. She wished she knew if a young lady of Dr. Booth's own circle would accept his invitation, and if so, just how. But she didn't know, so she replied, shaking her head, and keeping her needles in action, and her eyes upon them, "Oh, no thank you."

"But you've got to get home some way, haven't you?"

"Oh, you mean home!" she exclaimed.

Yes, he meant home, of course. But—he surveyed Reba with awakening interest. Had he been mistaken? Was that shy little manner of hers assumed?

"We could take the long way round home," he said.

Reba didn't know why the sudden change of Dr. Booth's voice sent such a thrill of pleasure through her. But it did!