“What have you seen?”

“O, nothing; I’ve heard, I mean!”

“What have you heard?”

“The name of a pretty man, with brass studs and a copper ring and a tin watch-chain, a little mixed up with your own. That’s all.”

“That’s a very unkind picture of Mr. Shiner, for that’s who you mean! The studs are gold, as you know, and it’s a real silver chain; the ring I can’t conscientiously defend, and he only wore it once.”

“He might have worn it a hundred times without showing it half so much.”

“Well, he’s nothing to me,” she serenely observed.

“Not any more than I am?”

“Now, Mr. Dewy,” said Fancy severely, “certainly he isn’t any more to me than you are!”

“Not so much?”