One of these crumpled-up bits of paper she had in her pocket now, having recovered it that she might tease him by quoting the lines at a provoking opportunity.
"It's not that.

It's some verses I've written," he said, with a wave of his hand.
"All your own ?" she asked with an air of assumed innocent interest, and he did not see the frivolous gleam in her eyes, or notice the touch of aloes on her tongue.
"Yes.

Yes.

I've always written verses more or less--I write a good many advertisements in verse," he added cheerfully.

"They are very popular.
Not genius, quite, but there it is, the gift; and it has its uses in commerce as in affairs of the heart.