“Well, because you made the claim!” Alix, hating herself for being betrayed into argument, said hotly.  “But I won’t talk about it, Anne,” she added, firmly, “and as far as coming to any agreement with me is concerned, you might just as well have gone back on the train with Cherry.  I hate to talk this way—­but we all think you acted very—­well, very meanly!” Alix finished rather flatly.

“Perhaps it’s just as well to understand each other!” Anne said, with hot cheeks.  They exchanged a few more sentences, wasted words and angry ones, and then Anne walked over to a seat in the shade, to wait for another train, and Alix, with her heart beating hard and her colour high, drove at mad speed back to the mountain cabin.

“I didn’t ask her to lunch—­I don’t care!” Alix said to herself, in agitation.  “She and Justin know they’re beaten—­they’re just trying to patch it up before it’s too late—­I don’t care—­I won’t have her think she can get away with any such scheme—!”

And so muttering and scolding, Alix got back to her dog and her barnyard, and soothed herself with great hosing and cleaning of the duck-pond, and much skimming and tasting of Kow’s preserves.  After all, she had grudged this perfect summer day to the city, and she was always happiest here, in the solitude of the high mountain.

CHAPTER XV

Meanwhile, Cherry, in the sick flutter of spirits that had become familiar to her of late, kept her dentist appointment, and at noon looked at a flushed and lovely vision of herself in the dentist’s mirror.

“Doctor has given me red lips!” said Cherry, trembling, and trying to smile to the nurse in attendance.

“I guess the good Lord gave you your looks,” Miss Maloney said generously.  “You’re the youngest-looking—­to be married!” she added.  “I said to my sister last week, ’That lady has been married nearly six years!’ ‘What!’ she said, ’That little girl of eighteen—!’”

“Why—­why don’t you come and have lunch with me, at the ’Pheasant’?” Cherry said, suddenly, pushing up the golden hair under her hat.

“I’d love it,” Miss Maloney said, appreciatively, “but Doctor has a one o’clock appointment after this one, and I shan’t get a bite until nearly three.  I’ve got crackers here—­”

Cherry went out into the blazing street; it was one of the hot noontides of the year.  At two o’clock a wild wind would spring up, and send papers and dust flying, but just now the heat was dry and clear and still.

She was carrying a parasol, and she opened it now and walked slowly toward Geary Street.  She could go and have a cup of tea and a salad at the Pheasant—­she could go to the Pheasant—­