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 blow it in. She's out with her father. Excuse me, please, I'm going to help Helen get dinner ready."

Aubrey sat down by the fire, and lit his pipe. The burden of his meditation was that it was just 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: