'
'You ought to. By the way, why are you so awful stand-offish? Is it
natural, or merely put on "for this occasion only"?'
'I do not know what you mean by "stand-offish."'
'You know very well what I mean. Why do you pretend to be so stiff and
formal with a fellow?'
'I am never stiff and formal with anyone unless I do not desire his
acquaintance.'
Fleming laughed loudly.
'I suppose that's a personal hint. Well, it seems to me, if this
exclusiveness is genuine, that you would be more afraid of newspaper
notoriety than of anything else.'
'Why do you say that?'
'Because I can't, for the life of me, see why you spend so much time with
Dolly Dimple. I am sure I don't know why she is here; but I do know this:
that you will be served up to the extent of two or three columns in the
_Sunday Argus_ as sure as you live.'
'I don't understand you.'
'You don't? Why, it's plain enough. You spend all your time with her.'
'I do not even know of whom you are speaking.'
'Oh, come now, that's too rich! Is it possible you don't know that Miss
Jennie Brewster is the one who writes those Sunday articles over the
signature of "Dolly Dimple"?'
A strange fear fell upon Wentworth as his companion mentioned the
_Argus_. He remembered it as J.K. Rivers' paper; but when Fleming said
Miss Brewster was a correspondent of the _Argus_, he was aghast.
'I--I--I don't think I quite catch your meaning,' he stammered.
'Well, my meaning's easy enough to see.
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