wouldn’t have been good for him if it had—­but even in six minutes I managed to lose the results of six months’ coldness.  Yet I was glad it was gone; glad just to be alive; and we’d look at each other and laugh like children.  You don’t realize what a good old place the world is until you’ve taken a chance on leaving it and weighed against death itself; all our little jealousies and misunderstandings seemed too trivial to count.  It seemed enough that I loved him and that he loved me and that neither of us had broken anything—­bones, I mean.  It was sad, though, to think the poor little bubble was a goner and that we’d never hear its honest little pant again.

“If we had lived up to the comic papers, Morty,” I said, “we would have spiflicated a red child, given a merry toot and disappeared in a cloud of dust!”

“I’m almost sorry we didn’t,” said Morty, who was dreadfully pale and always hated walking.  “We’ll know better next time.”

“There’ll be no next time for that bubble,” I said sadly.  “It’s sparked its last spark and will never choo-choo again!

“I mean our next car, of course,” said Morty (it was awfully sweet to hear him say “our.”  And it took the sting out of losing the little bubble, especially now that we’re going to have another).

“Yesterday Forbes Mason offered me his new four-cylinder Lafayette for twenty-eight hundred dollars,” said Morty; “it’s only been run five hundred miles, and I told him I’d think about it.”

“It’s suspiciously cheap,” I said.  “Sure he hasn’t cut the cylinders?”

“Well, you see, he broke his arm cranking.  It backfired on him, and his wife is such a little fool that he had to promise to give up automobiling.”

“They are splendid cars, with a record of fifty miles on the track, unstripped and out of stock!”

“And you shall have half-interest in it, Virgie!”

“I never could pay fourteen hundred dollars, Morty, and I don’t want any more of pa’s blanks.  It’s too exasperating.”

“Oh, I meant for nothing!”

“Then it’s a present—­and there’s always a string to your presents.”

“Isn’t there to everybody’s?”

“Besides, it’s an air-cooled motor,” I said, not wanting to appear too eager.  “Don’t they always overheat in time and stick the pistons?”

“Not the Lafayette!”

“Don’t tempt me,” I said.  “You know I couldn’t take it on any terms.”

“Forced feed lubrication and direct drive on the fourth speed,” he continued, like a stage villain offering diamonds to the heroine.

“What kind of a string?”

“Oh, Virgie, it was all a lie about Josie Felton.”

“I had it straight from Mrs. Gettridge and she’s Josie’s aunt and she ought to know, I guess.”

“Mrs. Gettridge is a social assassinator belongs to a regular Mafia of mischief-makers and old cats—­you know you used to care once.”