"I observe," he said, "that for once you have not advanced your opinion. Is this because you realise that it's valueless? Or won't your mouth work?" "Jonah was right," said I. "Insurance has its advantages, but you don't register every letter you post. The truth is, what little sense of proportion you have is failing. Of course you're not as young as you were, and then, again, you eat too much." "In other words," said my brother-in-law, "you attribute caution to the advance of old age and gluttony. I see. To which of your physical infirmities do you ascribe a superabundance of treachery and bile?" "That," said I, "is due to external influence. The sewer-gas of your temperament----" "I refuse," said Berry, "to sit still and hear my soul compared to a drain at the very outset of what promises to be a toothsome repast. It might affect my appetite." I raised my eyebrows. "Needless anxiety again," I sighed. "I don't know what's the matter with you to-day." "By the way," said Daphne, "I quite forgot. Did you cash your cheque?" "I did," said her husband. "What did they give you?" said Jill. "Fifty-three francs to the pound." "Fifty-_three_?" cried Daphne and Adèle in horror-stricken tones. "Fifty-three francs dead. If I'd cashed it yesterday, as, but for your entreaties, I should have done, I should have got fifty-six." "But when you found it was down, why didn't you wait?" "In the first place," retorted my brother-in-law, "it isn't down; it's up. In the second place, I was down--to four francs twenty-five. In the third place, to-morrow it may be up to fifty." "It's much more likely to go back to fifty-five." "My dear girl," said Berry, "with the question of likelihood the movements of the comic Exchange have nothing to do. It's a law unto itself. Compared with the Money Market of to-day, Monte Carlo's a Sunday-school. I admit we'd have more of a show if we didn't get the paper a day late.... Still, that makes it more sporting." "I don't see any sport in losing six hundred francs," said his wife. "It's throwing away money." Here my cousin reappeared. "Jonah, why did you let him do it?" "Do what?" said Jonah. "Cash such a cheque when the franc's dropped." "It hasn't," said Jonah. "It's risen." "How," piped Jill, "can it have risen when it's gone down?" "It hasn't gone down," said I. "But fifty-three's less than fifty-six." "Let me explain," said Berry, taking an olive from a dish. "You see that salt-cellar?" "Yes," said Jill, staring. "Well, that represents a dollar. The olive is a franc, and this here roll is a pound." He cleared his throat. "When the imports exceed the exports, the roll rises"--up went his hand--"as good bread should. But when the exports exceed the imports, or the President backs a winner, or something, then the olive begins to soar. In a word, the higher the fewer." Jill passed a hand across her sweet pretty brow. "But what's the salt-cellar got to do with it?"