"I was passing," said the beloved. "And somehow I couldn't help it. Of course, I knew it wasn't true about Mr Loggerheads. But I had to think of something." Richard was in ecstasy; had never been in such ecstasy. "I say," he said again. "I suppose _you_ didn't put your finger against the pendulum of that clock?" "Oh, _no_!" she replied with emphasis. "Well, I'm jolly glad it did stop, anyway," said Richard. "What a lark, eh?" She agreed that the lark was ideal. They walked down the road till a car should overtake them. "Do you think she suspects anything?" Eva asked. "I'll swear she doesn't," said Richard, positively. "It'll be a bit of a startler for the old girl." "No doubt you've heard," said Eva, haltingly, "that Mr Loggerheads has cast eyes on Mary." "And do you think there's anything _in_ that?" Richard questioned sharply. "Well," she said, "I really don't know." Meaning that she decidedly thought that Mary _had_ been encouraging advances from Mr Loggerheads. "Well," said Richard, superiorly, "you may just take it from me that there's nothing in it at all.... Ha!" He laughed shortly. He knew Mary. Then they got on a car, and tried to behave as though their being together was a mere accident, as though they had not become engaged to one another within the previous twenty-four hours. II Immediately after the departure of Richard Morfe and Eva Harracles, his betrothed, from the front door of the former, Mr Simon Loggerheads arrived at the same front door, and rang thereat, and was a little surprised, and also a little unnerved, when the door opened instantly, as if by magic. Mr Simon Loggerheads said to himself, as he saw the door move on its hinges, that Miss Morfe must have discovered a treasure of a servant who, when she had nothing else to do, spent her time on the inner door-mat waiting to admit possible visitors--even on Friday night. Nevertheless, Mr Simon Loggerheads regretted that prompt opening, as one regrets the prompt opening of the door of a dentist. And it was no servant who stood in front of him, under the flickering beam of the lobby-lamp. It was Mary Morfe herself. The simple explanation was that she had just sped her brother and Eva Harracles, and had remained in the lobby for the purpose of ascertaining by means of her finger whether the servant had, as usual, forgotten to dust the tops of the picture-frames. "Oh!" said Mr Loggerheads, when he saw Mary Morfe. For the cashier of the Bursley branch of the Birmingham and Sheffield Bank it was not a very able speech, but it was all he could accomplish. And Miss Mary Morfe said: "Oh!" She was thirty-eight, and he was quite that (for the Bank mentioned does not elevate its men to the august situation of cashier under less than twenty years' service), and yet they neither of them had enough worldliness to behave in a reasonable manner. Then Miss Morfe, to whom it did at last occur that something must be done, produced an invitation: