"When I went back to the room I found my brother-in-law sitting on the edge of the lounge, or what you call it, all dressed but his coat, rubbing his chin between his finger and thumb, and gazing with despairing perplexity at his feet.

It seems that my sister had got past all the other dilemmas, but in a moment of inadvertence had left the shoe question to him, with the result that he had put on one russet shoe and one black one, and had laced them up before discovering the discrepancy." "I don't see anything very difficult in that situation," remarked John.
"Don't you ?" she said scornfully.

"No, I suppose not, but it was quite enough for Julius, and more than enough for my sister and me.

His first notion was to take off _both_ shoes and begin all over again, and perhaps if he had been allowed to carry it out he would have been all right; but Alice was silly enough to suggest the obvious thing to him--to take off one, and put on the mate to the other--and then the trouble began.

First he was in favor of the black shoes as being thicker in the sole, and then he reflected that they hadn't been blackened since coming on board.