“Good gracious, Norma,” cried the little lady, in alarm. “You don't say that Jimmie is in love? Oh, it would spoil him. He can't be!”

“There was one picture—of a woman—which he would not let me see,” said Norma.

“Well?”

Norma paused for some seconds before she replied:

“He called it 'a mad artist's dream.' I have been wondering whether it was not better than a sane politician's reality.”

“What is a sane politician's reality, dear?” Connie asked, mystified.

“I am,” said Norma.

Then, woman-like, she turned the conversation to the turpitudes of her dressmaker.