sort of dim parallel between the passing of the bicycle and the last
ride of Tancred the Inconsolable along the banks of the Danube.

I have already mentioned, I think, how Mr. Pupkin and Zena
Pepperleigh first came to know one another. Like everything else
about them, it was a sheer matter of coincidence, quite inexplicable
unless you understand that these things are fore-ordained.

That, of course, is the way with fore-ordained affairs and that's
where they differ from ordinary love.


I won't even try to describe how Mr. Pupkin felt when he first spoke
with Zena and sat beside her as they copied out the "endless chain"
letter asking for ten cents. They wrote out, as I said, no less than
eight of the letters between them, and they found out that their
handwritings were so alike that you could hardly tell them apart,
except that Pupkin's letters were round and Zena's letters were
pointed and Pupkin wrote straight up and down and Zena wrote on a
slant. Beyond that the writing was so alike that it was the strangest
coincidence in the world. Of course when they made figures it was
different and Pupkin explained to Zena that in the bank you have to
be able to make a seven so that it doesn't look like a nine.

So, as I say, they wrote the letters all afternoon and when it was
over they walked up Oneida Street together, ever so slowly. When they
got near the house, Zena asked Pupkin to come in to tea, with such an
easy off-hand way that you couldn't have told that she was half an
hour late and was taking awful chances on the judge. Pupkin hadn't
had time to say yes before the judge appeared at the door, just as