“A great friend of yours, isn’t she?” she said. “I would hardly say that. I’ve only met her once.” “But you got on very well with her, I heard.” “I think I endeared myself to her pretty considerably.” “So I understood.” “I gave her a plot for a story,” said Sam. One of the rabbit-faced young men said that he could never understand how fellows--or women, for that matter--thought up ideas for stories--or plays, for the matter of that--or, as a matter of fact, any sort of ideas, for that matter. “This,” Sam explained, “was something that actually happened--to a friend of mine.” The other rabbit-faced young man said that something extremely rummy had once happened to a pal of his. He had forgotten what it was, but it had struck him at the time as distinctly rummy. “This fellow,” said Sam, “was fishing up in Canada. He lived in a sort of shack.” “A what?” asked the blonde shingled girl. “A hut. And tacked up on the wall of the shack was a photograph of a girl, torn out of an illustrated weekly paper.” “Pretty?” asked the dark shingled girl. “You bet she was pretty,” said Sam devoutly. “Well, this man spent weeks in absolute solitude, with not a soul to talk to--nothing, in fact, to distract his mind from the photograph. The consequence was that he came to look on this girl as--well, you might say an old friend.” “Sleddon,” said Mr. Braddock, “more champagne.” “Some months later,” proceeded Sam, “the man came over to England. He met the girl. And still looking on her as an old friend, you understand, he lost his head and, two minutes after they had met, he kissed her.” “Must have been rather a soppy kind of a silly sort of idiot,” observed the blonde shingled girl critically. “Perhaps you’re right,” agreed Sam. “Still, that’s what happened.” “I don’t see where the story comes in,” said one of the rabbit-faced young men. “Well, naturally, you see, not realising the true state of affairs, the girl was very sore,” said Sam. The rabbit-faced young men looked at each other and shook their heads. The shingled young women raised their eyebrows pityingly. “No good,” said the blonde shingled girl. “Dud,” said the dark shingled girl. “Who’s going to believe nowadays that a girl is such a chump as to mind a man kissing her?” “Everybody kisses everybody nowadays,” said one of the rabbit-faced young men profoundly. “Girl was making a fuss about nothing,” said the other rabbit-faced young man. “And how does the story end?” asked Aunt Julia. “It hasn’t ended,” said Sam. “Not yet.” “Sleddon!” said Mr. Braddock, in a quiet, dangerous voice. § 2