W. W. (contemptibly): That brings me into the thing again.
Tintinnabulum: Shut up and listen. The letter isn’t to be posted. Your mother will find it lying open on Patricia’s desk and read it on the sly.
W. W. (nobly): My mother never does things on the sly.
Tintinnabulum (comprehensively): Oh.
W. W. (hedging): What would the letter say?
Tintinnabulum: It would show her that you and Patricia knew what she was after and both wanted her to marry the chappie, and then she could put it back where she found it and never let on that she had seen it and make all her arrangements with a happy heart.
W. W.: That is what we want, but mother wouldn’t read a letter on the sly.
Tintinnabulum (after thinking it out when he should have been doing his prep.): Look here, if she is so fussy we can tell Patricia to leave the letter open on the floor as if it had blown there, and then when your mother picks it up to put it back on the desk she can’t help taking a look at it.
W. W.: Would that not be reading it on the sly?
Tintinnabulum (with cheerful cynicism): Not for a woman.