The Sin of Monsieur Pettipon Part 32

"What in the name of thunder have you been doing to your hair?" demanded his father, looking up from his pipe and paper.

"Combing it," replied Chester, coldly.

"With axle grease?" inquired Jessup senior, genially.

"And it does look so nice when it's dry and wavy," put in his mother.

Chester emitted a faint groan.

"Oh, Ma, you never seem to realize that I'm grown up," he protested.

"Wavy hair!" He groaned again.

"Well," remarked the father, "I suppose it's better that way than not combed at all. Seems to me that last summer you didn't care much whether it was combed, or cut either, for that matter."

"A woman has come into his life," explained his twenty-two year-old sister, from behind her novel.

"You just be careful who you go callin' a woman," exclaimed Chester, turning on her, with some warmth.

"Don't you consider Mildred Wrigley a woman?" asked Hilda, mildly.

"Not in the sense you mean it."

"By the way," said Hilda, "I saw her last night."

Chester's manner instantly became eager and conciliatory. "Did you?

Where?"

"At the Mill Street Baptist Church supper," said Hilda.

"At the supper?" Chester's tone suggested incredulity.

"Yes. And goodness me, I never saw a girl eat so much in my life.

She----"

"Hilda Jessup, how dare you!"

Chester's voice cracked with the emotion he felt at so d.a.m.nable an imputation.

"There, there, Hilda, stop your teasing," said Mrs. Jessup. "What if she did? A big, healthy girl like that----"

"Mother----" Chester's tone was anguished.

"Come, Nell," said Mr. Jessup, "leave him to his illusions. It's a bad day for romance when a man discovers that his G.o.ddess likes a second helping of corned beef."

"Father, how can you say such things! I will not stay here and listen to you say such things about one who I----"

"One whom," interrupted Hilda.

Chester flounced down the front steps and slammed the gate after him, in a manner that could not possibly be described as "nonchalant."

--2

The Wrigley home was four blocks away, and Chester, once out of sight of his own home, became meditative. He stopped, and after looking about to see that he was not observed, drew from his inside pocket an envelope, and for the twelfth time that day counted its contents. Ninety-four dollars! The savings of a lifetime! It had originally been saved for the purchase of a motor-cycle, but that was before Mildred Wrigley had smiled at him one day across the senior study-hall. That seemed but yesterday, and yet it must have been fully seven weeks before! He replaced the money and continued on his way.

Chester paused at the Greek Candy Kitchen on Main Street to buy a box of candy, richly bedight with purple silk, and by carefully gauging his saunter, contrived to arrive at the Wrigley residence at fourteen minutes after eight. He gave his tie a final adjustment, his hair a last frantic smoothing, licked his dry lips--and rang the bell.

"Oh, good evening, Chester."

Mildred Wrigley had a small, birdlike voice. She was looking not so much at Chester as at the beribboned purple box he held. They went into the parlor.

"Oh, Chester," cried Mildred, as she opened the purple box, "how sweet of you to bring me such heavenly candy. I just adore chocolate-covered cherries. I could just DIE eating them."

She popped two of them into her mouth, and sighed ecstatically. They discussed, with great thoroughness, the weather of the day, the weather of the day before and the probable weather of the near future. Then Mildred moved her chair a quarter of an inch nearer Chester's.

"There, now," she said, with her dimpling smile, "let's be real comfy."

A glow enveloped Chester.

"I had the most heavenly supper to-night," confided Mildred.

"I hardly ate at all," said Chester.

"Oh, you poor, poor boy," said Mildred. "Do pa.s.s me another candy."

They discussed school affairs, and the approaching examinations.

"I'm so worried," confessed Mildred. "Horrid old geometry. Stupid physics. What do I care why apples fall off trees? I'm going to go on the stage. That miserable old wretch, Miss Shufelt, has been writing nasty notes to Dad, saying I don't study enough."

Her lip trembled; she looked so small, so weak. "Look here," said Chester, hoa.r.s.ely, "we've known each other for a long time now, haven't we?"

"Yes, ever so long," said Mildred, taking another chocolate-covered cherry. "Months and months."

"Do you think one person ought to be frank with another person?"

"Of course I do, Chester, if they know each other well enough."

"I mean very frank."

"Well," said Mildred, "if they know each other very, very well, I think they ought to be very frank."

"How long do you think one person ought to know another person before he, or for that matter she, ought to be very frank with that person."

"Oh, months and months," answered Mildred.

Chester pa.s.sed his white silk handkerchief over his damp brow.

"When I say very frank, I mean very frank," he said.

"That's what I mean, too." She took another chocolate-covered cherry.