“Poor Mr. Bassity!” said Sattie Felton.  “I second the motion for reinstating him temporarily!”

Grace Sinclair was not so quick in giving her decision.  In her girlish heart she enjoyed the big man’s discomfiture, and was mischievous enough to prolong his suspense.  She knew that to him her opinion was the most important of all, and this gave her an added pleasure in withholding her verdict.  All three looked at her as she bent her pretty brown head and seemed to weigh the question.  She was a Southerner, and her French-Spanish blood betrayed itself in her grace, her slender hands and feet, and the type of her dark and unusual beauty.  She was more a woman than either Dolly or Sattie, and the fact that Mr. Bassity was desperately in love with her fanned within her breast a wilful desire to torment him.

“Let me think!” she said.

“’Pon my soul!—­” began that unfortunate young man, boisterously attempting to sway her judgment.

“Hush!” exclaimed Sattie Felton.

“She’s thinking,” said Miss Hemingway severely.

Mr. Bassity noisily subsided.

“I don’t know whether it’s worth while to forgive him,” said Grace at last.  “He’s so incorrigible—­so wild and woolly—­that if you’re nice to him he’s like one of those dogs that want to jump all over you!”

“Oh, Miss Sinclair, please, please—!” cried Coal Oil Johnny.

“Well, I won’t hang the jury,” continued Grace; “only it must be clearly understood that we have the privilege of making a few remarks”

Mr. Bassity made a pantomime of baring his breast.

“Strike!” he said.

“You first,” said Dolly to Grace.

“Last Tuesday I was playing golf at the links,” began that young lady vindictively.  “Mr. Bassity volunteered to call for me at four and take me home in his French automobile.  I knew we were going too fast and said so twice, but he only answered, ’Oh, bother!’ or something equally polite and gracious.  Then as we raced into Franklin Street we found a rope across it and sixteen policemen waiting to arrest us!  Pleasant, wasn’t it?—­with a million people looking on; and my picture next day in the paper.  I was so mortified I could have cried, and I can’t think of it even now without burning all over”

“Perhaps the prisoner might care to offer some explanation?” suggested Miss Hemingway.

“Well, really, it was most unfortunate,” admitted Coal Oil Johnny.  “The fact is, the low gear is chewed up on that car, and I’ve always been forced to run it on the intermediate—­and the most you can throttle down the intermediate to is eighteen miles an hour!”

“The legal speed being eight, I believe,” Icily interjected Miss Sinclair.

“I don’t know what the silly law is,” continued Mr. Bassity, “but the only way to obey it would be to get out and push the car.  Couldn’t ask a lady to do that, could I?”

“You could have thrown in your intermediate and then thrown it out again, and run on momentum,” said Miss Sinclair.  “That’s automobile A B C!”