Ginger! What a crack you just gave me!" She was all compunction and honey now, hovering around him where he stood stanching honourable wounds.

After a while he laughed.

"Thunder!" he exclaimed ruefully; "my nose seems to be growing for fair.

You're all right, Geraldine." "Here's my last cup-cake, if you like," said his sister, radiant.
Embarrassed a little by defeat, but nursing no bitterness, he sat down on the leather divan again and permitted his sister to feed him and tell him that his disaster was only an accident.

He tried to think so, too, but serious doubts persisted in his mind.