Part 52 (2/2)
”Do you think she cares for him?”
”Quahte as moch as he desoves.”
”What makes you all down on Beaton around here? He's not such a bad fellow.”
”We awe not all doan on him. Mrs. Leighton isn't doan on him.”
”Oh, I guess if it was the old lady, there wouldn't be much question about it.”
They both laughed, and Alma said, ”They seem to be greatly amused with something in there.”
”Me, probably,” said Beaton. ”I seem to amuse everybody to-night.”
”Don't you always?”
”I always amuse you, I'm afraid, Alma.”
She looked at him as if she were going to snub him openly for using her name; but apparently she decided to do it covertly. ”You didn't at first.
I really used to believe you could be serious, once.”
”Couldn't you believe it again? Now?”
”Not when you put on that wind-harp stop.”
”Wetmore has been talking to you about me. He would sacrifice his best friend to a phrase. He spends his time making them.”
”He's made some very pretty ones about you.”
”Like the one you just quoted?”
”No, not exactly. He admires you ever so much. He says” She stopped, teasingly.
”What?”
”He says you could be almost anything you wished, if you didn't wish to be everything.”
”That sounds more like the school of Wetmore. That's what you say, Alma.
Well, if there were something you wished me to be, I could be it.”
”We might adapt Kingsley: 'Be good, sweet man, and let who will be clever.'” He could not help laughing. She went on: ”I always thought that was the most patronizing and exasperating thing ever addressed to a human girl; and we've had to stand a good deal in our time. I should like to have it applied to the other 'sect' a while. As if any girl that was a girl would be good if she had the remotest chance of being clever.”
”Then you wouldn't wish me to be good?” Beaton asked.
”Not if you were a girl.”
”You want to shock me. Well, I suppose I deserve it. But if I were one-tenth part as good as you are, Alma, I should have a lighter heart than I have now. I know that I'm fickle, but I'm not false, as you think I am.”
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