“To-morrow, or day after,” Miss Julianna answered, as Beata took away the plates that had had the meat on them and substituted some plates on which were lettuce and red cheese. After this came a pastry, and that made Miss Bannister say, “Tart again!” in a high, querulous voice. “Bally things!” said Miss Meek, who, I soon found, loved to be thought a sport and used lots of English slang, I think, because she had been a governess and still taught English to a few Italians, and was afraid of being considered school-teachery or prim. They both ate their tarts just as if they enjoyed them, while Mr. Hemmingway began to tell about how the first tart was made in England, and was side tracked by the reason that had made the man who had told it to him, _tell_ it to him. I began to see that he was really ever so funny, and to feel like smiling each time he said, “Now let me see, it was raining that day _if_ I recall correctly, or was it the day before that day when it rained so heavily? It seems to me it was _that_ day, because I remember I had some new galoshes which I had gotten in East London at one of the curb stalls, and I recall the getting them, because--” And on and on! His mind was full of little paths that led him away from the main road, which even a clever person could only occasionally glimpse through the haze Mr. Hemmingway made by details. After we had finished the “tart,” Miss Meek pushed back her chair, and boomed out “Draughts?” to which Miss Bannister, who still seemed querulous, answered, “If you like--” And they got out a checker board from behind a bookcase that was by a window; Beata cleared one corner of the table, and they began. Mr. Hemmingway stood looking on, rocking back and forth, first on his heels and then on his toes, and as he did this he tried, I think, to tell of a game of checkers he had seen played between experts somewhere in Brazil, but of course I couldn’t really tell. “When I was a youngster--” he began, “now _was_ I twenty-three or was I twenty-four? It seems to me I was twenty-four, because the year before I had typhus, and I am certain that that happened in my twenty-third year, and directly after my convalescence I took passage for South America which would make me twenty-four at that time, since my birthday is in November, (_the year’s saddest month_) and having gone directly after that, I must, therefore, have passed my twenty-fourth birthday--” “Ho hum--” grunted out Miss Meek. “However, no matter,” said Mr. Hemmingway quickly, “What I was about to entertain with is the history of my witnessing a match of draughts played between experts in San Paola. . . . And how keenly I remember it! The day was fine--” “Ho hum!” groaned Miss Meek. “What’s he saying?” asked Miss Bannister. “Not a bally thing! getting ready, don’t you know!” Miss Meek shouted in answer, and I did feel sorry for him, but my sympathy wasn’t needed, for Miss Meek’s attitude, I soon learned, made no impression.