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MARGE: And if you can’t get me, whom would you like?

BIRSCH: Well, Lady Artemis Morals has some gift for publicity. But Alfred won’t marry a title–say’s he rather thinks of making a title for himself. The boy’s got ambition. The cash is forthcoming. And you can do the rest.

MARGE: It is a flattering offer. You’ll let me think over it?

He kindly consented, and we returned to the boat. However, on the way back the sea became very rough and unpleasant; and I threw up the idea.

(By the way, you don’t mind me writing the dialogue, as above, just as if it were a piece out of a play? I’ve always brought the sense of the theatre into real life.)

Poor Aaron Birsch! He was only one of the very many men who have been extremely anxious that I should marry somebody else. Two years later Alfred died of cerebral tumescence–a disease to which the ambitious are peculiarly liable. That cat, Millie Wyandotte, happened to say to Birsch that if I had married his son I should now have been a wealthy young widow.

“Anybody who married Marge,” said Birsch, “would not die at the end of two years.”

“I suppose not,” said Millie. “He’d be more likely to commit suicide at the end of one.”

I never did like that girl.

But I must speak now of what was perhaps my most serious engagement. Hugo Broke–his mother was one of the Stoneys–was intended from birth for one of the services and selected domestic service. Here it was thought that his height–he was seven foot one–would tell in his favour. However, the Duchess of Exminster, in ordering that the new footman should be dismissed, said that height was desirable, but that this was prolixity.

However, it was not long before he found a congenial sphere for his activities with the London branch of the Auto-extensor Co. of America. The Auto-extensor Co. addresses itself to the abbreviated editions of humanity. It is claimed for the Auto-extensor system that there is absolutely no limit to the increase in height which may be obtained by it, provided of course, that the system is followed exactly, that nothing happens to prevent it, and that the rain keeps off.

Hugo walked into the Regent Street establishment of the Auto-extensor people, and said:

“Good morning. I think I could be of some service to this company as an advertisement.”

“I am sure you could,” said the manager. “If you will kindly wait a moment while the boy fetches the step-ladder I will come up and arrange terms.”

In the result, the large window of the Regent Street establishment was furnished as a club smoking-room or thereabouts. In the very centre, in a chair of exaggerated comfort but doubtful taste, sat Hugo. He was exquisitely attired. He read a newspaper and smoked cigarettes. By his side, in a magnificent frame, was a printed notice, giving a rather fanciful biography of the exhibit.

“This gentleman,” the notice ran, “was once a dwarf. For years he suffered in consequence agonies of humiliation, and then a friend called his attention to the Auto-extensor System of increasing height. He did not have much faith in it, but in desperation he gave it a trial–and it made him what he now is. Look for yourselves. Facts speak louder than words. All we ask you to do is to trust the evidence of your own eyes.”

The window proved a great attraction. The crowd before it was most numerous about four o’clock, because every day at that hour a dramatic and exciting scene was witnessed. Putting down his newspaper, Hugo struck a bell on a little table by his side. A page entered through the excessively plush curtains at the back, and Hugo gave a brief and haughty order. The boy somewhat overacted respectful acquiescence, retired through the curtains, and reappeared again with tea and thin bread and butter. Of these delicacies Hugo partook coram populo. This carried conviction with it. One onlooker would say to another: “Shows you he’s real, don’t it? At one time I thought it was only a dummy.” And for some time afterwards the assistant in the shop would be kept busy, handing out the gratis explanatory booklet of the Auto-extensor Co.