"I hope she'll call the police. If she doesn't I will."
"Don't worry. She's part of this strange situation. She'll comprehend as soon as I begin to explain. She is intelligent; you only have to look at her to understand that."
Smith choking with impotent fury, nevertheless ventured a swift glance. Her undeniable beauty only exasperated him. "To think--to think," he burst out, "that a modest, decent, law-loving business man like me should suddenly awake to find his boyhood friend had turned into a godless votary of Venus!"
"I'm not a votary of Venus!" retorted Brown, turning pink. "I'll punch you if you say it again. I'm as decent and respectable a business man as you are! And my grammar is better. And, thank Heaven! I've intellect enough to recognize a miracle when it happens to me.... Do you think I am capable of harboring any sentiments that might bring the blush of coquetry to the cheek of modesty? Do you?"
"Well--well, I don't know what you're up to!" Smith raised his voice in bewilderment and despair. "I don't know what possesses you to act this way. People don't experience miracles in New York cross-town cars. The wildest stretch of imagination could only make a coincidence out of this. There are trillions of girls in cross-town cars dressed just like this one."
"But the basket!"
"Another coincidence. There are quadrillions of wicker baskets."
"Not," said Brown, "with the contents of this one."
"Why not?"
Smith instinctively turned to look at the basket balanced daintily on the girl's knees.