"Dear me, how can I tell? Buying plows or pigs or——"

Nancy tried to make her tone seem airily indifferent, when all the time she was really consumed with curiosity and a desire, too, to tell him how splendidly her work was going.

"I have seen Theodore Hoffman!"

"What?"

"Don't look as though you thought I'd gone mad. He's human. I happened to hear that he was staying at Bluff Point, so I went over to see the gentleman."

Nancy's eyes did say that she thought he had gone quite out of his mind!

"How did you dare?"

"I know a fellow that knows him. He was very nice—as I said, he's human, terribly human. You should see him playing tennis!"

"What—what did you say to him?"

"I told him I had a little friend who was soon to become one of the greatest playwrights in the world and——"