When he met Mrs. Adair he found both. Polly Adair, as every one who dared to do so preferred to call her, was, like himself, an American and, though absurdly young, a widow. In the States she would have been called an extremely pretty girl. In a community where the few dozen white women had wilted and faded in the fierce sun of the equator, and where the rest of the women were jet black except their teeth, which were dyed an alluring purple, Polly Adair was as beautiful as a June morning. At least, so Hemingway thought the first time he saw her, and each succeeding time he thought her more beautiful, more lovely, more to be loved. He met her, three days after his arrival, at the residence of the British agent and consul-general, where Lady Firth was giving tea to the six nurses from the English hospital and to all the other respectable members of Zanzibar society. "My husband's typist," said her ladyship as she helped Hemingway to tea, "is a copatriot of yours. She's such a nice gell; not a bit like an American. I don't know what I'd do in this awful place without her. Promise me," she begged tragically, "you will not ask her to marry you." Unconscious of his fate, Hemingway promised. "Because all the men do," sighed Lady Firth, "and I never know what morning one of the wretches won't carry her off to a home of her own. And then what would become of me? Men are so selfish! If you must fall in love," suggested her ladyship, "promise me you will fall in love with"--she paused innocently and raised baby-blue eyes, in a baby-like stare--"with some one else." Again Hemingway promised. He bowed gallantly. "That will be quite easy," he said. Her ladyship smiled, but Hemingway did not see the smile. He was looking past her at a girl from home, who came across the terrace carrying in her hand a stenographer's note-book. Lady Firth followed the direction of his eyes and saw the look in them. She exclaimed with dismay: "Already! Already he deserts me, even before the ink is dry on the paper." She drew the note-book from Mrs. Adair's fingers and dropped it under the tea-table. "Letters must wait, my child," she declared. "But Sir George--" protested the girl. "Sir George must wait, too," continued his wife; "the Foreign Office must wait, the British Empire must wait until you have had your tea." The girl laughed helplessly. As though assured her fellow countryman would comprehend, she turned to him. "They're so exactly like what you want them to be," she said--"I mean about their tea!" Hemingway smiled back with such intimate understanding that Lady Firth glanced up inquiringly. "Have you met Mrs. Adair already?" she asked. "No," said Hemingway, "but I have been trying to meet her for thirty years." Perplexed, the Englishwoman frowned, and then, with delight at her own perspicuity, laughed aloud.