She signed "Mary Amanda Selmer" very precisely, with old-fashioned curls at the end of each word.

Then, quite unexpectedly, she slipped an arm around Johnny's neck and kissed him on his tanned cheek where a four-day's growth of beard was no more than a brown fuzz scarcely discernible to the naked eye.

She gave his shoulder two little affectionate pats that said plainly, "There, there, don't you worry one bit," and went away without a word.

Johnny gulped and winked hard, and wished that Mary V was more like her mother, and hoped that Sudden was not looking at him.
Sudden was folding the paper very carefully and slipping it into an envelope, on the face of which he wrote "John Ivan Jewel, $3000.

secured note, due -- --" whenever the date said.