"But what do you mean?" says Charlie.
"Why," I say to him, "she laid a wager last Christmas Day that you would not be married within a year. And now you say you mean to bring Franziska over on the 4th of December next. Isn"t it so?"
"Oh, no!" he says; "we don"t get married till the spring."
You should have heard the burst of low, delightful laughter with which Queen t.i.ta welcomed this announcement. She had won her wager.