"Not really? How splendid! Accept my congratulations! This is the finest thing that could possibly have happened. These are not idle words. As one who has been engaged to the girl himself, I speak feelingly. You are well out of it, Sam." Sam thrust aside his hand. Had it been his neck he might have clutched it eagerly, but he drew the line at shaking hands with Eustace Hignett. "My heart is broken," he said with dignity. "That feeling will pass, giving way to one of devout thankfulness. I know! I've been there. After all ... Wilhelmina Bennett ... what is she? A rag and a bone and a hank of hair?" "She is nothing of the kind," said Sam, revolted. "Pardon me," said Eustace firmly, "I speak as an expert. I know her and I repeat, she is a rag and a bone and a hank of hair!" "She is the only girl in the world, and owing to your idiotic behaviour I have lost her." "You speak of the only girl in the world," said Eustace blithely. "If you want to hear about the only girl in the world, I will tell you. A week ago I was in the Subway in New York...." "I'm going to bed," said Sam brusquely. "All right. I'll tell you while you're undressing." "I don't want to listen." "A week ago," said Eustace Hignett, "I will ask you to picture me seated after some difficulty in a carriage in a New York subway; I got into conversation with a girl with an elephant gun." Sam revised his private commination service in order to include the elephant gun. "She was my soul-mate," proceeded Eustace with quiet determination. "I didn't know it at the time, but she was. She had grave brown eyes, a wonderful personality, and this elephant gun. She was bringing the gun away from the down-town place where she had taken it to be mended." "Did she shoot you with it?" "Shoot me? What do you mean? Why, no!" "The girl must have been a fool!" said Sam bitterly. "The chance of a life-time and she missed it. Where are my pyjamas?" "I haven't seen your pyjamas. She talked to me about this elephant gun, and explained its mechanism. You can imagine how she soothed my aching heart. My heart, if you recollect, was aching at the moment--quite unnecessarily if I had only known--because it was only a couple of days since my engagement to Wilhelmina Bennett had been broken off. Well, we parted at Sixty-sixth Street, and, strange as it may seem, I forgot all about her." "Do it again!" "Tell it again?" "Good heavens, no! Forget all about her again." "Nothing," said Eustace Hignett gravely, "could make me do that. Our souls have blended. Our beings have called to one another from their deepest depths, saying ... There are your pyjamas, over in the corner ... saying, 'You are mine!' How could I forget her after that? Well, as I was saying, we parted. Little did I know that she was sailing on this very boat! But just now she came to me as I writhed on deck...." "Did you writhe?" asked Sam with a flicker of moody interest. "I certainly did." "That's good!" "But not for long."