Breakfast was waiting for us when we came downstairs and we gave a reasonably good impersonation of an elderly married couple at the breakfast table. I read the financial section of the "Times" and Germaine again busied herself with the social page of the "Herald-Tribune", now and then reading brief items about marriages, and divorces, while I grunted noncommitally about the state of the market. As a matter of fact, we both believed we had succeeded admirably when our attention was attracted by a meaning kind of cough. It was Mary-Myrtle. "What is it, Myrtle?" Germaine asked with a radiant smile. "It's not my business to say so," the maid stammered, "but I wanted to know whether you would really keep me on. I--I like it here--and I'm so glad you're happy, Mrs. Tompkins." "Of course, you're going to stay with us, Myrtle, but however did you guess?" "You can see it in your face, Mrs. Tompkins," she said, "and Mr. Tompkins he was looking at the sporting page and talking about U.S. Steel and A.T.&T. And--oh, it's nice." And she fled from the room. Germaine looked at me like the angel at the Gates of Eden. "There!" she exclaimed. "That's what happens when I trust you. You can't even find the right page in the paper to fake from. Next time I'm going to marry a man who doesn't look so damned happy it's a give-away." "It's spring," I explained stupidly. "You know, Winnie," my wife said suddenly, "speaking of spring, I've been thinking about Ponto. You've had him for five years now and I think he's getting a little queer. Don't you think it would be a good idea to send him to the kennels and have him bred? Perhaps that's all that's been wrong with him." "Spoken like a woman, Jimmie," I said, "but I agree that it wouldn't do any harm. I'll phone Dalrymple after breakfast and have him send over for Ponto's Sacre du Printemps. He's got championship blood and, unlike holy matrimony, there's money in it." She shrugged her shoulders unspeakably. "Poor Winnie!" she mocked. "You'd be worth millions if you'd been paid, like Ponto." "It mightn't be a bad idea, at that," I remarked. "If you realize the years of apprenticeship and training, the high degree of professional skill required--" "Come here, then," she ordered, "I'll pay you." She did. "You won't forget about Ponto," she added breathless after her kiss. "The poor darling oughtn't to be celibate in this household. I wouldn't want it to happen to a dog." CHAPTER 26 On the morning of Monday, April 23rd (the date seemed unimportant at the time), I took the early morning train into New York. Spring had done its fell work and the club car was full of middle-aged business-men, with dark circles under their eyes, prepared to fight at the drop of a hat anyone who said they weren't as young as they felt. With Jimmie's perfume still in my nostrils, I hadn't the heart to deride them, so I did the next best thing and talked them into a poker-game.