Indeed, the answer to the enquiry "Stop what?" might so very plausibly be "Stop it all," that it was a profitless question. It was just after two that the telephone on Prideaux's table rang. (Kitty was working in Prideaux's room now.) "Hullo," said a voice in answer to hers, "Mr. Prideaux there? Or anyone else in his room I can speak to? The Minister speaking." Not his P.S. nor his P.A., but the Minister himself; an unusual, hardly seemly occurrence, due, no doubt, to lunch-time. Kitty was reminded of a story someone had told her of a pert little office flapper at one end of a telephone, chirping, "Hullo, who is it?" and the answer, slow, dignified, and crushing, from one of our greater peers--"Lord Blankson ..." (pause) "HIMSELF." "Mr. Prideaux isn't in yet," said Kitty. "Can I give him a message?" There was a moment's pause before the Minister's voice, somehow grown remote, said, "No, thanks, it's all right. I'll ring him up later." He rang off abruptly. (After all, how can one ring off in any other way?) He had said, "Or anyone else in his room I can speak to," as if he would have left a message with any chance clerk; but he had not, apparently, wished to hold any parley with her, even over the telephone, which though it has an intimacy of its own (marred a little by a listening exchange) is surely a sufficiently remote form of intercourse. But it seemed that he was avoiding her, keeping her at a distance, ringing her off; his voice had sounded queer, abrupt, embarrassed, as if he was shy of her. Perhaps he had thought things over and perceived that he had been encouraging one of his clerks to step rather too far out of her position; perhaps he was afraid her head might be a little turned, that she might think he was seeking her out.... Kitty sat on the edge of Prideaux's table and swore softly. She'd jolly well show him she thought no such thing. "These great men," she said, "are insufferable." 7 When they next met it was by chance, in a street aeroplane. The aero was full, and they didn't take much notice of each other till something went wrong with the machinery and they were falling street-wards, probably on the top of that unfortunate shop, Swan and Edgar's. In that dizzy moment the Minister swayed towards Kitty and said, "Relax the body and don't protrude the tongue," and then the crash came. They only grazed Swan and Edgar's, and came down in Piccadilly, amid a crowd of men who scattered like a herd of frightened sheep. No one was much hurt (street aeros were carefully padded and springed, against these catastrophes), but Kitty chanced to strike the back of her head and to be knocked silly. It was only for a moment, and when she recovered consciousness the Minister was bending over her and whispering, "She's killed. She's killed. Oh God." "Not at all," said Kitty, sitting up, very white. "It takes quite a lot more than that." His strained face relaxed. "That's all right, then," he said.