“Who knows, Jane,” I observed, in a forlorn manner, “but that the telephone is watched? They must suspect. But how? How?”
Jane was indeed a fidus Achates. She went out to the drug store and telephoned to Tom, being careful not to mention my name, because of the clerk at the soda fountain listening, saying merely to keep away from a Certain Person for a time as it was dangerous. She then merely mentioned the word “revolver” as meaning nothing to the clerk but a great deal to Tom. She also aranged a meeting in the Park at 3 P.M. as being the hour when father signed his mail before going to his Club to play bridge untill dinner.
Our meeting was a sad one. How could it be otherwise, when to loving Hearts are forbiden to beat as one, or even to meet? And when one or the other is constantly saying:
“Turn your back. There is some one I know coming!”
Or:
“There’s the Peters’s nurse, and she’s the worst talker you ever heard of.” And so on.
At one time Tom would have been allowed to take out their Roadster, but unfortunately he had been forbiden to do so, owing to having upset it while taking his Grandmother Gray for an airing, and was not to drive again until she could walk without cruches.
“Won’t your people let you take out a car?” he asked. “Every girl ought to know how to drive, in case of war or the chauffeur leaving——”
“—— or taking a Grandmother for an airing!” I said coldly. Because I did not care to be criticized when engaged only a few hours.
However, after we had parted with mutual Protestations, I felt the desire that every engaged person of the Femanine Sex always feels, to apear perfect to the one she is engaged to. I therfore considered whether to ask Smith to teach me to drive one of our cars or to purchace one of my own, and be responsable to no one if muddy, or arrested for speeding, or any other Vicissatude.