An hour after leaving Mary, Clifford sat in the Grand Alcazar restaurant, looking into the bland, genial, cunning, loose-skinned old face. He had just finished telling Uncle George of his discovery of the whereabouts of Mary Regan and the other events of the day. The old man regarded Clifford with meditative, puckered gaze--a gaze of somewhat peculiar effect, begotten by his lack of eyebrows and eyelashes. “Son,” he began slowly, “the thing that stands out in this chunk of _vers libre_ you’ve been handing me, is the fact that you’re so stuck on that little dame Mary Regan--” “Let’s leave me, and what I may think of her, out of it,” put in Clifford. “Don’t interrupt, son. You ask me a thing and you’ve got to let me spiel along in my own way”--which, indeed, was one of the difficulties not to be avoided in consulting Uncle George. “Now, you listen to me, son, and you’ll hear something out of the original book out of which old Solomon and those other wise guys that have been playing big time steady for three or four thousand years swiped all their good gags. Son, you’re too damned monogamous! You’re insulting God: what the hell d’you suppose he made so many pretty girls for?--and let the others get wise on how to make themselves pretty? Now, I like Mary Regan as well as any male person can who’s not her relative and who’s not trying to be--but if she tried any of that beautiful female cussedness on me, I’d throw her one smiling kiss, mail her a picture post-card of the jumping-off place, and proceed to admire some of the other works of God.” Uncle George nodded, and started to sip his white wine thinned with sparkling water. “Thanks, Uncle George. But let’s get back--” “Hold on, son. That was just my first sentence. Supposing Mary Regan is trying to put something across by holding back a little of the truth--sort of saving it up for a rainy day. Well, what of that? Ain’t we all liars? You take it from your Uncle George, a superannuated old burglar, president emeritus of that grand old _alma mater_, the University of Broadway, who’s played every kind of game with every kind of male and female now decorating this earth--take it from me, son, I’ve never seen the strait and narrow road of truth congested with the traffic. That’s one road you can speed on, and not even see a cop. So, son, if Mary Regan has been like the rest of us, don’t hold it especially against her. And her marrying Jack Morton by holding back a bit of the evidence, it’s not going to hurt him such a lot.” “I’m thinking of what it may do to her.” “Why, now, son, a marriage now and then seems to improve a lot of women. And the only time a few marriages seem to be a handicap to some women is when they undertake to sign their names in full.” “You’re in very good voice this evening, Uncle George. But, if you don’t mind, let’s talk about how to stop that marriage, and how to find out Loveman’s game.”