"Why didn't you print a retraction?"
"I don't know."
"I do. It's because, Miss Roberta, beneath your cynicism and your assumption of masculinity, you are as sympathetic as a young mother. It would be mean to put over anything like that, and you just can't do it."
"Nonsense. You see what I print at times—"
"Bert," he said suddenly, "why don't you get married?"
"Who, me?" Then she laughed. "I guess I'm too sympathetic. It would be mean to put over anything like that on a man, and a girl wouldn't have me."
"Well, then, why don't you buy some real estate?" he continued, jocularly. "Every man should have some dissipation—something to make him forget his other troubles."
"A little late in the meal for that word, isn't it?"
He stared a moment, and then sprang to his feet. "I beg your pardon. What will you drink?"
"What you drink."