"There's no doubt about him, of course! But the chick would have told me at once if...."
"If there had been anything to tell. No doubt she would."
"Of course, it's absurd to suppose he could see so much of her as he does, and not...."
"Perfectly absurd! But then, you know, that young fiddler was very bad, indeed, about the chick until he made her acquaintance."
"So he was." Thoughtfully, as one who weighs.
"The kitten met him with a sort of stony geniality that would have knocked the heart out of a Romeo. If Juliet had known the method, she could have nipped Shakespeare in the bud."
"She didn't want to. Sally did."
"But then Shakespeare might have gone on and written a dry respectable story—not a love-story; an esteem story—about how Juliet took an interest in Romeo's welfare, and Romeo posted her letters for her, and presented her with a photograph album, and so on. And how the families left cards."
"But it isn't exactly stony geniality. It's another method altogether with the doctor—a method the child's invented for herself."