upon the Chesters' porch of a summer evening, the three of
them about him, and he had seemed to enjoy talking. He
certainly could not be wholly occupied with the machine, for
at no time did he let the engine out for what it could do, but
contented himself with a steady, moderate pace very different
from the sort of furious speed in which he and the Green Imp
were accustomed to indulge when occasion offered. Altogether
he presented to the girl a problem which she could not solve
and was never further from solving than during the
seventy-five miles she sat beside him on the run home.

"You're all to come in and have an ice-cool, salad-y supper
with us," Mrs. Macauley declared as the car turned in at the
home driveway. "Hot coffee, too, if you want it - or even
beefsteak if you prefer. But I thought since it was so hot -"

"I'll take the beefsteak," announced Burns over his shoulder,
"if I find nothing urgent for, me to do. If there's a call -"

"If there is, make it, and you shall have the beefsteak when
you get back," Martha promised him. Mrs. Macauley was of the
sort of young married woman who delights to make her friends
comfortable - and none better than Red Pepper, who was her
husband's most valued friend, as he was that of his neighbour
on the other side, Arthur Chester.

To everybody's regret the call was waiting, and as the party
went in to supper they waved their hands at the Green Imp
flying away down the road. It was not till long after the
"ice-cool, salad-y supper" was ended and the women, freshly