Page:Tongues of Flame (1924).pdf/114

 "I'll do it. I get his 'dosshiay, volunteered Scanlon heartily. "Good night."

Henry stood with a puzzled air contemplating the door which had closed upon his departing visitor. Was Scanlon just the most honest soul in the world, or was he a most convincing actor? Pending an answer, he reached for the telephone, for there were now things so much more pleasant to think of.

"Doctor's been and gone," he reported blithely, if tardily, to Miss Billie Boland; "I'm feeling perfectly chipper, you may tell your father."

"As to your head?"

"Yes, Miss Boland."

"And as to your heart?" He heard the silvery peal of her laughter.

"I didn't consult the doctor about it."

Again that silvery peal. He was both chagrined and stirred. That she could twit him about his stupid confession argued no depth of responsive feeling on her side, yet it argued also the establishment of most amicable relations. It argued—hope.

"I—I'll be on hand for the golf game," he stammered. "Goo—good night, Miss Boland."

"See you are! Good night." The clear voice cadenced and he knew she was still laughing at him, but he didn't care. "Am I in right?" he crowed, and hugged himself boyishly. "Well, I guess yes!"

Then his mind went absurdly off to the fracas on the island. "I wonder . . . I wonder who beaned me," he frowned. Nothing in the silence seemed to answer him and he subsided slowly into a nebulous state of mind. In the nebula a radiant figure glowed, a star, a goddess! at the recognition of whom he stared.