oved her cigarette from her mouth and did something in the
gutter which is usually associated with the floor of third-class smoking
carriages. Then her handsome, boyish face, more boyish because her hair
was closely clipped, broke into a broad grin.

"Hullo, Mapp!" she said. "Been giving the tradesmen what for on Tuesday
morning?"

Miss Mapp found it extremely difficult to bear this obviously insolent
form of address without a spasm of rage. Irene called her Mapp because
she chose to, and Mapp (more bitterness) felt it wiser not to provoke
Coles. She had a dreadful, humorous tongue, an indecent disregard of
public or private opinion, and her gift of mimicry was as appalling as
her opinion about the Germans. Sometimes Miss Mapp alluded to her as
"quaint Irene," but that was as far as she got in the way of reprisals.

"Oh, you sweet thing!" she said. "Treasure!"

Irene, in some ghastly way, seemed to take note of this. Why men like
Captain Puffin and Major Flint found Irene "fetching" and "killing" was
more than Miss Mapp could understand, or wanted to understand.

Quaint Irene looked down at her basket.

"Why, there's my lunch going over the top like those beastly British
Tommies," she said, "Get back, love."

Miss Mapp could not quite determine whether "love" was a sarcastic echo
of "Treasure." It seemed probable.

"Oh, what a dear little lobster," she said. "Look at his sweet claws."

"I shall do more than look at them soon," said Irene, poking it into her
basket again. "Come and have tiffin, qui-hi, I've got to look after
myself to-day."

"What has happened to your devoted Lucy?" asked Miss Mapp. Irene lived
in a very queer way with one gigantic maid, who, but for her sex, might
have been in the Guards.

"Ill. I suspect scarlet-fever," said Irene. "Very infectious, isn't it?
I was up nursing her all last night."

Miss Mapp recoiled. She did not share Major Flint's robust views about
microbes.

"But I hope, dear, you've thoroughly disinfected----"

"Oh, yes. Soap and water," said Irene. "By the way, are you Poppiting
this afternoon?"

"If I can squeeze it in," said Miss Mapp.

"We'll meet again, then. Oh----"

"Au reservoir," said Miss Mapp instantly.

"No; not that silly old chestnut!" said Irene. "I wasn't going to say
that. I was only going to say: 'Oh, do come to tiffin.' You and me and
the lobster. Then you and me. But it's a bore about Lucy. I was painting
her. Fine figure, gorgeous legs. Y