"
When they had finished their lunch Linda began packing the box
and Donald sat watching her.
"At this point," said Linda, "Daddy always smoked. Do you
smoke?"
There was a hint of deeper color in the boy's cheeks.
"I did smoke an occasional cigarette," he said lightly, "up to
the day, not a thousand years ago, when a very emphatic young
lady who should have known, insinuated that it was bad for the
nerves, and going on the presumption that she knew, I haven't
smoked a cigarette since and I'm not going to until I find out
whether I can do better work without them."
Linda folded napkins and packed away accessories thoughtfully.
Then she looked into the boy's eyes.
"Now we reach the point of our being here together," she said.
"It's time to fight, and I am sorry we didn't go at it gas and
bomb
›' the minute we met. You're so different from what I thought
you were. If anyone had told me a week ago that you would take
off your coat and mess with my automobile engine, or wear Katy's
apron and squeeze lemons in our kitchen I would have looked
! him over for Daddy's high sign of hysteria, at least. It's too
bad to
I have such a good time as I have had this afternoon, and then
end with a fight."
I"That's nothing," said Donald. "You couldn't have had as
| good a time as I have had. You're like another boy. A fellow
can be just a fellow with you, and somehow you make everything
you touch mean something it never meant before.
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