blanket, and she pounced on the bed and reduced it to the most
horrible neatness. All the beds looked as if they had been made up
with a carpenter's square.

On the third trip, however, Jane Brown was writing at the table.
Twenty-two wheeled himself into the doorway and eyed her with
disapproval.

"What do you mean by sitting down?" he demanded sarcastically.
"Don't you know that now you are in charge you ought to keep
moving?"

To which she replied, absently:

"Three buttered toasts, two dry toasts, six soft boiled eggs, and
twelve soups." She was working on the diet slips.

Then she smiled at him. They were quite old friends already. It is
curious about love and friendship and all those kindred emotions.
They do not grow nearly so fast when people are together as when
they are apart. It is an actual fact that the growth of many an
intimacy is checked by meetings. Because when people are apart it is
what they _are_ that counts, and when they are together it is what
they do and say and look like. Many a beautiful affair has been
ruined because, just as it was going along well, the principals met
again.

However, all this merely means that Twenty-two and Jane Brown were
infinitely closer friends than four or five meetings really
indicates.