t a week since he had first met Titania,
and in all that week there had been no waking moment when he had not
thought of her. He was wondering how long it might take for a girl to
fall in love? A man--he knew now--could fall in love in five minutes,
but how did it work with girls? He was also thinking what unique
Daintybits advertising copy he could build (like all ad men he always
spoke of building an ad, never of writing one) out of this affair if he
could only use the inside stuff.

He heard a rustle behind him, and there she was. She had on a gray fur
coat and a lively little hat. Her cheeks were delicately tinted by the
winter air. Aubrey rose.

"Why, Mr. Gilbert!" she said. "Where have you been keeping yourself
when I wanted to see you so badly? I haven't seen you, not to talk to,
since last Sunday."

He found it impossible to say anything intelligible. She threw off her
coat, and went on, with a wistful gravity that became her even more
than smiles:

"Mr. Mifflin has told me some more about what you did last week--I
mean, how you took a room across the street and spied upon that hateful
man and saw through the whole thing when we were too blind to know what
was going on. And I want to apologize for the silly things I said that
Sunday morning. Will you forgive me?"

Aubrey had never felt his self-salesmanship ability at such a low ebb.
To his unspeakable horror, he felt his eyes betray him. They grew
moist.

"Please don't talk like that," he said. "I had no right to do what I
did, anyway. And I was wrong in what I said about Mr. Mifflin. I
don't wonder you were angry."

"Now surely you're not going to deprive me of the pleasure of thanking
you," she said. "You know as well as I do that you saved my life--all
our lives, that night. I guess you'd have saved poor Bock's, too, if
you could." Her eyes filled with tears.

"If anybody deserves credit, it's you," he said. "Why, if it hadn't
been for you they'd have been away with that suitcase and probably
Metzger would have got his bomb on board the ship and blown up the
President----"

"I'm not arguing with you," she said. "I'm just thanking you."

It was a happy little party that sat down in Roger's dining room that
evening. Helen had prepared Eggs Samuel Butler in Aubrey's honour, and
Mr. Chapman had brought two bottles of champagne to pledge the future
success of the bookshop. Aubrey was called upon to announce the result
of his co