'Not really. You'll like it once you've begun. And anyhow I can't play by myself, can I,' I said, still trying to be gay and simple. 'You wouldn't want me to be lonely, would you.' But I was faltering. Mrs. Barnes's eye was on me. Impossible to go on being gay and simple beneath that eye. I faltered more and more. 'Sometimes I think,' I said, almost timidly, 'that we're wasting time.' 'Oh no, do you really?' exclaimed Mrs. Barnes anxiously. 'Do you not consider Merivale--' (here if I had been a man I would have said damn Merivale and felt better)--'very instructive? Surely to read a good history can never be wasting time? And he is not heavy. Surely you do not find him heavy? His information is always imparted picturesquely, remarkably so. And though one may be too old for games one is fortunately never too old for instruction.' 'I don't _feel_ too old for games,' said Dolly. 'Feeling has nothing to do with reality,' said Mrs. Barnes sternly, turning on her. 'I only thought,' I said, 'that to-day we might talk together instead of reading. Just for once--just for a change. If you don't like the idea of telling stories out of our lives let us just talk. Tell each other what we think of things--of the big things like--well, like love and death for instance. Things,' I reassured her, 'that don't really touch us at this moment.' 'I do not care to talk about love and death,' said Mrs. Barnes frostily. 'But why?' 'They are most unsettling.' 'But why? We would only be speculating--' She held up her hand. 'I have a horror of the word. All speculation is abhorrent to me. My brother-in-law said to me, Never speculate.' 'But didn't he mean in the business sense?' 'He meant it, I am certain, in every sense. Physically and morally.' 'Well then, don't let us speculate. Let us talk about experiences. We've all had them. I am sure it would be as instructive as Merivale, and we might perhaps--perhaps we might even laugh a little. Don't you think it would be pleasant to--to laugh a little?' 'I'd love to,' said Dolly, her eyes shining. 'Suppose, instead of being women, we were three men--' Mrs. Barnes, who had been stiffening for some minutes, drew herself up at this. 'I am afraid I cannot possibly suppose that,' she said. 'Well, but suppose we _were_--' 'I do not wish to suppose it,' said Mrs. Barnes. 'Well, then, suppose it wasn't us at all, but three men here, spending their summer holidays together can't you imagine how they would talk?' 'I can only imagine it if they were nice men,' said Mrs. Barnes, 'and even so but dimly.' 'Yes. Of course. Well, let us talk together this morning as if we were nice men,--about anything and everything. I can't _think_,' I finished plaintively, 'why we shouldn't talk about anything and everything.' Dolly looked at me with dancing eyes.