I could never bring her up to my standard of play, not
within forty in a hundred, by reason that she'd use the rest for
almost every stroke. She had a sense of humour, had Maria: you'd
have got along with her, Mr. Collingwood, and she'd have got along
with you. You'd have struck sparks. One evening I asked her,
'Maria, why are you so fond of the jigger?' 'Because of my figger,'
says she, pat as you please. Now, wasn't that humorous, eh? She
_meant_, of course, that being of the buxom sort in later life--and
it carried her off in the end--' Why, hallo!" Jimmy exclaimed.
"Are we home already?"
"We have arrived at the Temple, E.C.," said I gently, "but scarcely
yet at the beginning of the story."
He resumed it in our chambers, while I operated on the hearth with a
firelighter.
"Well," said Jimmy, smoking, "to cut a long story short"--and I
grunted my thanks--"he told me he was a lonely man, but that he knew
a thing or two yet. Had I by any chance made acquaintance with the
'Catalafina,' in Soho? 'Oh, come!' said I bashfully, 'who is she?'
'It's a restarong,' said he: 'Italian: where the cook does things you
can't guess what they're made of.
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