exactly the same conclusion, else there isn't any sympathy in it. But
it's got to be by two totally different routes, you understand, else
there isn't any talky-talk to it!"

Laboriously one eyebrow began to jerk its way up his forehead, and
with a purely mechanical instinct he reached up drolly and pulled it
down again. "So--as the initial test of your mutual congeniality this
afternoon," he resumed, "I would therefore respectfully suggest as a
special topic of conversation the consummate cheek of--yours truly,
Paul Reymouth Edgarton!"

Starting to bow once more, he backed instead into the screen of the
office window. Without even an expletive he turned, pushed in the
screen, clambered adroitly through the aperture, and disappeared
almost instantly from sight.

Very faintly from some far up-stairs region the thin, faint, single
syllable of a laugh came floating down into the piazza corner.

Then just as precipitous as a man steps into any other hole, Barton
stepped into the conversational topic that had just been so aptly
provided for him.

"Is your father something of a--of a practical joker, Miss Edgarton?"
he demanded with the slightest possible tinge of shrillness.

For the first time in Barton's knowledge of little Eve Edgarton she
lifted her eyes to him--great hazel eyes, great bored, dreary, hazel
eyes set broadly in a too narrow olive face.