But Jane had sprung to her feet.
“I won’t eat my lunch!” she cried. “And I won’t call up André! I think you’re too mean! You don’t understand! You don’t understand anything!” Her voice was breaking. She wouldn’t cry before them! She rushed from the room.
“It’s a long time,” she heard her mother say, as she reached the door, “since Jane has had a tantrum.”
She stumbled up the stairs. She gained the refuge of her bedroom and banged the door. The book was gone. She couldn’t go to André’s. She couldn’t help him with that play. She flung herself on her bed in stormy tears.
It wasn’t very long before the door opened and Isabel entered, without a knock. Jane lay very still and tried to hush her sobs.
“Don’t be silly, kid,” said Isabel. She sat down on the bed.
“Don’t talk to me,” said Jane.
“Stop crying,” said Isabel reasonably, “and be sensible.”
There was a little pause.
“That’s a dreadful play, Jane,” said Isabel.
Jane didn’t reply.
“Sarah Bernhardt does it,” said Isabel. “She’s an awful woman.”
Jane lay very still.
“When she was here,” said Isabel, “none of us girls were allowed to see her. She’s not nice.”
Jane sat up. André’s reverent accents still rang in her ears.
“She has beautiful hair,” thought Jane. “Golden brown—and frizzy.”
“What do you mean by ‘not nice’?” she inquired indignantly.
Isabel’s face looked a little queer. She was watching her younger sister rather curiously.
“Immoral,” said Isabel finally.
“I don’t believe it,” said Jane, after a moment.
“Oh, yes, she is,” said Isabel easily. “Everyone knows that.”
Jane stared, unconvinced. Isabel was still looking at her in that funny way.
“Don’t you know what I mean?” said Isabel.
There was an awful pause. Jane wasn’t sure that she did. But it sounded dreadful.
“I—don’t—believe—it,” said Jane slowly. “André said—”
“French people are different,” said Isabel. “They don’t mind things like that.”
“They’re not different!” said Jane. But of course she knew that they were. Not different like that, though. Whatever it was, if it were true, André couldn’t know it.
“Now, don’t be silly, Jane,” said Isabel once more. “Minnie’s keeping your lunch. Go down and eat it and then telephone André and tell him.”
“I can’t tell him!” wailed Jane.
“Well—you can tell him something,” said Isabel plausibly. “You can tell him that Mamma doesn’t want you to stay indoors on such a bright afternoon.”
“Do you want me to lie to him?” said Jane.
“Well, Jane!” Isabel was actually laughing. “You wouldn’t tell him the truth, would you?”
“I won’t he to André,” said Jane. “Besides, Mamma—”
“Oh, Mamma’ll get over it. She won’t care what you say as long as you don’t go.”
The door opened again. Jane’s mother stood on the threshold.
“Don’t be silly, Jane,” she said.
Jane wiped her eyes.
“Go down and eat your lunch!” She patted Jane very nicely on the shoulder. They all turned toward the door.
“Isabel,” said her mother, halfway down the hall, “I can’t find that book anywhere. I left it on my desk.”
“Oh!” said Isabel, and her voice sounded a bit confused. “It’s in my room. I started to bring it downstairs for you.”
Jane looked through Isabel’s door. There was the little yellow volume on the sofa, with Jane’s own French dictionary beside it. Jane despised Isabel, for a moment. Her mother picked up the volume gingerly as if it burned her fingers.
“I never expected to see,” she said, “a paper-covered French book in this house.”
“All French books have paper covers,” Jane began. André had told her that. But of course it was no use. She didn’t go on with it. Instead she went downstairs and tried to eat her lunch at the pantry table beneath the telephone, thinking of what she had better say to André.
The telephone was very new. It had only been put in that autumn and Jane usually thought it was lots of fun to use it. But she didn’t think so now. When she had eaten her ham and one preserved peach she stood before it quite a little time in silence before she gave André’s number.
He answered the call himself. She knew his voice immediately. His funny telephone voice, trickling so miraculously into her ear, when he was four long city blocks away.
“Hello, Jane,” he said.
She didn’t waste any time on preliminaries.
“I can’t come over,” she said miserably.
“Why not?” said André.
Jane gulped a little before she could reply.
“Mamma—Mamma—” she began weakly. How could she tell him?
“I don’t hear you,” said André.
“Mamma,” said Jane desperately. She couldn’t tell him. “Mamma wants me to play out of doors—it’s such a nice day.”
“Oh,” said André. He sounded very sorry. “Well—perhaps we could take a walk by the lake.”
Jane fell a prey to panic. This was what always happened when you lied.
“I—I can’t,” she said very quickly. “I—I’m going over to Flora’s.”
“Oh,” said André. And his voice sounded just a little queer.
“We—are going to play in her yard,” said Jane.
“I see,” said André.
“I—I’ll see you tomorrow,” said Jane.
He didn’t answer.
“Won’t I?” asked Jane pitifully.
“Oh, yes,” said André. “Yes. I—I’ll be waiting.”
“Well, goodbye,” said Jane.
“Goodbye,” said André. “I’m awfully sorry.”
Jane hung up the receiver. She felt perfectly miserable. She had lied to André. She despised Isabel, yet she’d taken her advice. And he hadn’t believed her. He hadn’t believed her at all. He had known she was lying. Jane was plunged in despair. Well—at least she could go over to Flora’s. She could make that he come true.
Flora’s front door was opened by Flora’s butler. Jane always felt a little uneasy with butlers but she knew this one very well. He had been with the Furnesses for years. Not like Muriel’s butlers who changed every month or so. He smiled reassuringly down at Jane.
“Miss Flora is upstairs,” he said. All Flora’s servants called her “Miss Flora.” It was very impressive. At home everyone said just “Jane.”
Jane walked very softly down Flora’s hall, skirting the black walnut furniture with care. The floor was very slippery and the tiger skin rug before the fireplace snarled with its papier-mâché jaws and glared with
