Molly.  "All the girls think I touch it up. As a matter of fact it's one of the few parts of me I don't."  She paused. "What were you really saying about me, Tony?" 

 "Oh, quite nice things," he replied.  "Can you fancy me saying anything else?" 

 "No," she said.  "I'll admit you're an amiable beast as men go. But why haven't you been to see me lately?" 

 Grasping his opportunity Tony darted across the bows of an onrushing motor-bus, and gained the comparative shelter of Regent Street. 

 "If it is a fact," he observed, "I can only attribute it to idiocy." 

 "You know it's a fact," said Molly, "and it's hurt me, Tony. I wouldn't mind being chucked by any one else. But somehow you're different. I have always looked on you as a pal." 

 Tony slipped his left hand off the wheel for a second and lightly squeezed hers. 

 "So I am, Molly," he said.  "Why on earth should I have changed?" 

 "I thought you might be sick with me about—well, about Peter." 

 "Good Lord, no," said Tony.  "I never criticize my friends' hobbies. If I haven't routed you out lately, it's only because I've been really busy." 

 Her face brightened.  "You're a nice old thing, Tony," she said.  "Come and lunch with me to-morrow if you're not booked up. Just us two. I really do want to have a talk with you, badly." 

 "Right-o," said Tony.  "You'll be able to give me the latest stable information about Lopez. It's the fight to-morrow night, you know." 

 Molly nodded.  "Peter thinks he's going to win all right," she said.  "He's cocksure about it." 

 "I gathered that," said Tony.  "I ran into da Freitas at the Club just now and he bet me a level two hundred we were in for a whipping. I shouldn't think he was a gentleman who chucked away his money out of patriotic sentiment." 

 Molly made as near an approach to an ugly face as nature would allow. 

 "You don't like him?" inquired Tony artlessly. 

 "He's a pig," said Molly, and then after a short pause she added with some reluctance, "but he's a clever pig." 

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