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280 Benjy? Tell me about him. Those dreadful fits of dizziness. So hard to understand.”

She beautifully succeeded in detaching the Major from the rest. With the peace that had descended on Tilling, she had forgiven him for having been made a fool of by the Contessa.

“I’m anxious about my friend Puffin,” he said. “Not at all up to the mark. Most depressed. I told him he had no business to be depressed. It’s selfish to be depressed, I said. If we were all depressed it would be a dreary world, Miss Elizabeth. He’s sent for the doctor. I was to have had a round of golf with Puffin this afternoon, but he doesn’t feel up to it. It would have done him much more good than a host of doctors.”

“Oh, I wish I could play golf, and not disappoint you of your round, Major Benjy,” said she.

Major Benjy seemed rather to recoil from the thought. He did not profess, at any rate, any sympathetic regret.

“And we were going to have had our Christmas dinner together to-night,” he said, “and spend a jolly evening afterwards.”

“I’m sure quiet is the best thing for Captain Puffin with his dizziness,” said Miss Mapp firmly.

A sudden audacity seized her. Here was the Major feeling lonely as regards his Christmas evening: here was she delighted that he should not spend it “jollily” with Captain Puffin ... and there was plenty of plum-pudding.

“Come and have your dinner with me,” she said. “I’m alone too.”

He shook his head.

“Very kind of you, I’m sure, Miss Elizabeth,” he said, “but I think I’ll hold myself in readiness to go across to poor old Puffin, if he feels up to it. I feel lost without my friend Puffin.”