“It was like a thunderbolt. The girl’s name, it seems, is Ray Denison, and according to Gussie she does something which he describes as a single on the big time. What this degraded performance may be I have not the least notion. As a further recommendation he states that she lifted them out of their seats at Mosenstein’s last week. Who she may be, and how or why, and who or what Mr. Mosenstein may be, I cannot tell you.”

“By Jove,” I said, “it’s like a sort of thingummybob, isn’t it? A sort of fate, what?”

“I fail to understand you.”

“Well, Aunt Julia, you know, don’t you know? Heredity, and so forth. What’s bred in the bone will come out in the wash, and all that kind of thing, you know.”

“Don’t be absurd, Bertie.”