"Mary——?"
"Damer."
"I like the name," says Wade, repeating it. "It sounds simple and thoroughbred."
"Just what she is. One of the nine simple-hearted and thorough-bred girls on this continent."
"Nine?"
"Is that too many? Three, then. That's one in ten millions. The exact proportion of Poets, Painters, Oratory, Statesmen, and all other Great Artists. Well,—three or nine,—Mary Damer is one of them. She never saw fear or jealousy, or knowingly allowed an ignoble thought or an ungentle word or an ungraceful act in herself. Her atmosphere does not tolerate flirtation. You must find out for yourself how much genius she has and has not. But I will say this,—that I think of puns two a minute faster when I'm with her. Therefore she must be magnetic, and that is the first charm in a woman."
Wade laughed.
"You have not lost your powers of analysis, Peter. But talking of this heroine, you have not told me anything about yourself, except apropos of punning."
"Come up and dine, and we'll fire away personal histories, broadside for broadside! I've been looking in vain for a worthy hero to set vis-à-vis to my fair kinswoman. But stop! perhaps you have a Christmas turkey at home, with a wife opposite, and a brace of boys waiting for drumsticks."
"No,—my boys, like cherubs, await their own drumsticks. They're not born, and I'm not married."