Mr. Lester saw that I was worrying about something, and did his best to cheer me up with his remarks which really were laughable had I been in the mood for laughing. When we were standing on the point, with the bottom of the canyon miles below us, he said:
“It would be simply killing to fall off of here.”
A little later he said:
“If a man tripped and fell down, it would be some trip.”
Then he told a story about a man whom he said jumped out of the nineteenth story of the Masonic Temple, and when he got to the eighth floor he said to himself:
“Well, I am all right so far.”
Of course, it was simply nonsense, because the man could not of talked, and if he had of been able, he would not of had time.
I noticed that Mr. Garrett hardly smiled at all all the time we were out, though he tried his best to be cheerful and do right by those who he was showing the sights to. Poor boy, it made me feel like a criminal to look at him, and yet, was it my fault?
Kate was still lying down when we got back to the hotel, and looked like she had been crying, but I thought it best not to talk on the subjects I knew was occupying her thoughts. She got up and changed her dress, and I helped her fix her hair, which would not be bad if it was not so stringy and perfectly straight.
“Kate,” I said, trying to cheer her up, “you look almost pretty with that dress and your hair fixed that way.”
Mr. Coles was at the supper table when we got there. I could see he was still suffering from his headache, and I wished he had been alone so I could of comforted him. He bowed to both of us when we sat down, but I noticed Kate did not return his bow and had nothing to say all through supper. How silly of her to take it that way, just as though I was never going to look at a man on her account. Mr. Garrett did not appear in the dining-room at all, and I did not see him at all this evening.
Mr. Coles excused himself before we were through. I hoped he would go out on the porch or wait somewhere else for me so that I could ask him how he felt and perhaps help him to forget his suffering, but when I went on the porch no one was there only Mr. Lester and some of the rest of the party who I do not know. Kate had gone straight to our room from the table. Mr. Lester and myself walked up and down together for a few minutes, but he began making such silly remarks that after a while I left him and came in here to my room.
“What has come over this bunch?” was Mr. Lester’s first remark. “Everybody acts sore at each other.”
“I have not noticed anything,” was my reply, as I did not think it necessary to take him into my confidence.
“Your eyes are just ornaments, then,” he said. “Your friend and Coles did not speak at supper and Garrett has had a grouch all day.”
“Well,” I said, “maybe they are not feeling well. You know Mr. Coles has a sick headache.”
“No such a thing,” said Mr. Lester. “He pretended he had a headache so he would not have to go down to the canyon with us. But he had a date with your friend to go walking by themselves.”
“You are always joking, Mr. Lester,” I said.
“There is no joke about it,” was his reply. “He tried to get your friend to go walking with him, and she turned him down cold. And tonight they had a date to go rotten-logging, and that is off, too.”
“Mr. Lester,” I said, you can carry your jokes too far. Mr. Coles would not care to hear you talk like that, and neither would my girlfriend. She is not the kind that goes rotten-logging, as you call it.”
“Then what was she doing that night at Old Faithful’ and last night at the lake?” he said.
“She was tired out and was resting in her room,” I said.
“You think she was,” he said.
“Mr. Lester,” I said coldly, “you are trying to be funny or else you are trying to find out something. Whichever it is, I am tired of listening and think I will go to bed.”
“Don’t hurry,” was his reply. “I will promise to be good, and maybe we can have a little logging party of our own.”
“That will do, Mr. Lester,” I said coldly, and left him.
Mr. Lester is the kind of man who is comical sometimes, but does not know when to stop. Imagine a man wanting to go out walking with Kate, and especially a man like Mr. Coles.
Kate has been in bed for hours, and I am going to bed myself, but I know I shall not sleep, for I will not only be thinking about my poor, dear boy with his sick headache, but also about Mr. Garrett, who has something a thousand times worse, because it lasts so long, a wound in his heart.
Friday, September 1: Diary, my heart is broken, and the sooner die the better.
Thank God, I found out in time before it was too late the kind of a man Mr. Coles is, and Mr. Garrett, too. And, thank God, I have at last seen Kate in her true colors, she who posed as my friend, but who is false to the core.
Our
