"Oh, it took a large number of straws to break the camel's back. When it broke----" "Bing!" obligingly supplied Jerry. "I can picture the wrath of an outraged Baretti." "He was wrathful more than once before he said a word. The Sans used to be awfully noisy when they dined or lunched here. Guiseppe did not like that. They used to reserve tables by telephone, then, when they reached here for dinner, they would claim he had not reserved the tables they had asked for. That was a trick of Leslie Cairns. She would tell him that he ought not charge extra for the tables as he had not complied with her order properly. There were all sorts of little points like that which the Sans used to argue with him. They used to tease him purposely to see him get angry. When he is very angry he says not a word. He clenches his hands and his face turns fiery red. His eyes snap and he looks as though he would like to turn inside out. He half opens his mouth, then turns on his heel and scuttles off. "One evening in February," Vera continued, "Leila and I came here for dinner. One of the sophs had a birthday and she was giving a dinner to eighteen of her classmates. Remember, Leila? They had those three tables over there." Vera nodded toward the opposite side of the room. "The room was quite well filled, when in came Leslie Cairns, Joan Myers and Natalie Weyman with three girls who had come from a prep. school to spend a week-end with Joan. There wasn't a single table at which they all could sit. Instead of calling Guiseppe, Leslie Cairns walked straight to the soph who was giving the dinner, and claimed she had taken a table which Joan had reserved by telephone. The soph should simply have stayed away upon her dignity and called Signor Baretti. She was indignant, naturally, and began to argue the matter with Miss Cairns. They both grew furious and talked so loudly you could hear them all over the room. Natalie Weyman undertook to champion Leslie, and Leslie told her to shut her mouth and mind her own affairs. She is _so_ uncouth when she loses her temper. Honestly, a regular pow-wow went on for a few minutes." Vera stopped her narrative to laugh as she recalled that very stormy altercation. Leila was also laughing. Nor could the other listeners fail to be amused. "I can imagine how that poor soph felt to be jumped on so unexpectedly, when she was playing the agreeable hostess at her own birthday party." Jerry's sympathy for the injured sophomore did not prevent her from laughing. The funny side of such tragedies invariably struck Jerry first. "How did the pow-wow end?" "Very likely an enraged Baretti swooped down on them and read them the law in broken and indignant English," guessed Ronny, with a glance toward the cashier's desk, where the stolid little proprietor sat counting the day's receipts.