"
Then they all broke out talking at once. John drew a big chair for me to
the fire, and there was such an ado, adjusting lights and fending me with
screens.
"You _are_ well?" John asked, obstinately planting himself between me
and the others.
"Perfectly. How absurd you are!"
It was so ridiculous that I should be coddled after the triumph of my
life, as if something awful had happened to me.
I had felt annoyed all day, so far as anything can now annoy me, by John's
too solicitous guardianship, and it vexed me anew when he began to pile up
cautions against this and against that--to warn me against going out alone
upon the street, and to urge care even in my intercourse with Cadge. He is
quicker than my Aunt; he divined the source of the _Star_ article,
and he almost forbade me to cleave to such an indiscreet friend.
"Oh, last night won't happen again," I said carelessly; "and you don't
know Cadge; she's as good as the wheat."
I wasn't listening to him. I was twisting his ring impatiently on my
finger and watching in the play of the fire a vision of the great Opera
House, the lights, the jewels, the perfumes, the white, wondering faces.
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