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 days, if you understand, and four days is something a little more than sufficient, you see; but happily for ourselves we are leaving to-morrow for Bougie, as she is. I ventured to express the hope that we might lunch together to-morrow at Yakouren, you see, and share the same table in the evening at Bougie, and indeed, in a general way, rather maintain a liaison between the two automobiles, as it were, from time to time, during the remainder of our expedition to Biskra. Ah—Madame Momoro was so charming as to appear agreeable to the project. In the meantime, as I proposed a few rubbers of bridge for this evening, she was generous enough to say that she and her son would be delighted to encounter my wife and me in that pastime."

Ogle's impression had always been that the English were a conservative people, slow to make friends, and with strangers reserved even to the point of discourtesy. Now he perceived that either this was a great mistake or that General Broadfeather was a supreme exception. Seldom in his life, the American thought, had he met a man who proposed so much intimacy upon so slight an acquaintance.

"You play?" Sir William inquired.

"Bridge? No."