"Yes, I am Kitty," she answered with animation. "But you? I am sure I know you? My sister has a photograph of a Station group—ah, you are 'Jack'! I can't remember the other name."
"Darling!" he prompted eagerly with a suspicion of fervour. To hear her pronounce his name was to listen to the most adorable music.
"Of course! Fancy my forgetting! And your chum in the police is Tommy Deare? How perfectly priceless! I know you both intimately. You live in a little three-roomed bungalow near the Courts, all among weeds and snakes, and never go to church unless you are caught and taken!"
"You've got it exactly!" he returned delighted. Was there ever such a girl before? Why is a dimple in the left cheek like—nothing on earth? he wondered ecstatically. Because it is so absolutely divine! he concluded, mentally, to his own intense satisfaction at the inspiration.
"Now what a pity I am not my sister!" she said mischievously. "What a great deal you must have in common."
"I shall call on your sister if I may. At present—I am quite content," he returned wishing his appointment at a fashionable club in Mayfair at Jericho. For a dime he would let it slide and follow her to the ends of London.
"I am sure my sister will be delighted," said Kitty cordially. Then followed an exchange of addresses, Jack's being the name of a well-known club. "Mother always welcomes Joyce's friends from India. They come for a week-end and usually stay a week. The name India is a passport to our house."
"Of course I led up to it," the minx said to Joyce on describing the meeting. "I couldn't dream of letting him vanish and be lost to us, when he is the most delightful boy I have ever met."
"A very naughty boy, I am afraid, though I have a soft corner for him," said Mrs. Meredith, who considered the recital of Jack's misdeeds unfit for Kitty's ears.
"It is the naughty ones that are generally so nice," Kitty said with a sigh. "They are so human and attractive."