This produced a moment of laughter on the part of us both; we giggled
joyously together amid the silence and wares for sale, the painted cups,
the embroidered souvenirs, the new food, and the old family "pieces."

So this delightful girl was a verbal skirmisher! Now nothing is more to
my liking than the verbal skirmish, and therefore I began one
immediately. "I see you quite know," was the first light shot that I
hazarded.

Her retort to this was merely a very bland and inquiring stare.

I now aimed a trifle nearer the mark. "About him--her--it! Since you
practically live in the Exchange, how can you exactly help yourself?"

Her laughter came back. "It's all, you know, so much later than 1812."

"Later! Why, a lot of it is to happen yet!"

She leaned over the counter. "Tell me what you know about it," she said
with caressing insinuation.

"Oh, well--but probably they mean to have your education progress
chronologically."

"I think I can pick it up anywhere. We had to at the plantation."

It was from my table in the distant dim back of the room, where things
stood lumpily under mosquito netting, that I told her my history. She
made me go there to my lunch. She seemed to desire that our talk over the
counter should not longer continue. And so, back there, over my chocolate