"For two whole days?"
"Well—er—yesterday I—er—thought you'd better be left alone, and—er—where did you meet that young man?"
"Oh, Bertha Sands introduced him—he's a dear! You came just a minute too late." Miss Dorn laughed and squeezed her uncle's arm. "He's so amusing. You'd love to meet him!"
"That silly ass!" grunted Admiral Paulding. "Not much. He makes my toe itch! I've got a good name for him—'the smoke-room pest.' He's always doing card tricks under your unwilling nose, pretending to sit on somebody's hat, upsetting the dominos! If he can get a laugh out of a waiter, he's perfectly satisfied. I squelched him the other day, I can tell you!"
"What did you do?" Miss Marcia asked the question with mock seriousness.
"Never mind; but I taught him a lesson. Marcia, my dear, you do pick up the most peculiar acquaintances."
"But, really, my dear Nuncky, he's so clever, so quick at repartee—m—m—I'd be afraid! Tell me how you did it."
"Never mind how; but let me tell you this! That young man would never say anything sensible if he could help it, and never do anything useful, even by accident! And I think that you, my dear Marcia——"
"It's been a perfectly lovely day," remarked Miss Dorn abstractedly.