say a gleeful good-bye to him and his diagrammatic “engagement?” I expect so: I expect there’s a time-table for each one, drawn up and carefully put away for reference in one of the locked drawers of his big cleared desk.

“I think that something more might be done at once about this arrangement of ours.”

“Oh, yes?”

[40]

[40]

(A fortnight! Neither too long nor too short a time, he probably considered, for some “fresh development” to take place.)

“So what about my taking you out to lunch to-day?”

What about it? A vivid mental picture of the expression on the faces of Miss Robinson, Miss Holt and Smithie rose before me. What—what would they look like when——Well! They’ve got to look it sooner or later, so it might as well begin to-day.

“Certainly,” I nearly said. Then I hesitated. No! Why should he be able to “fit in” every single detail of his plans, with the ease of a born jig-saw genius? Why shouldn’t he have to make some rearrangement, consult someone else’s convenience for once in his life? I would just try to put my tiny little spoke in his wheel here, to see.

“Mr. Waters, would you mind making it to-morrow instead?”

“Much the same to me,” returned my employer rather unexpectedly—still, I suppose he would allow a twenty-four hours’ margin in these arrangements, in case of accidents. “But why wait?”

“Oh, because”—No woman ever does anything for one unadulterated motive; a thing men won’t understand! So I had my second choice of reasons quite ready, and it was quite[41] naturally, as well as truthfully (for I was thinking of Smithie’s preparations for an outing), that I suggested—“it would seem more ‘natural’ if I were to have on a new—my best hat to go out to lunch in instead of the little old cap I put on because of this drizzle to-day.”

[41]

“Ah! Very well,” said Mr. Waters, with his succinct nod. He added, “I suppose that sort of thing is what they mean when they say—when women say—that women have a much better eye to detail in business than men have?”

(I 

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