"When you people get all through this nonsense," he announced, "maybe you'll be kind enough to let me know! I shall be in the writing-room!" With satirical courtesy he bowed first to Eve, then to Barton, dallied an instant on the threshold to repeat both bows, and went out, slamming the door behind him. "A nervous man, isn't he?" suggested Barton. Gravely little Eve Edgarton considered the thought. "Trionychoidea," she prompted quite irrelevantly. "Oh, yes--of course," conceded Barton. "But do you mind if I smoke?" "No, I don't mind if you smoke," singsonged the girl. With a palpable sigh of relief Barton lighted a cigarette. "You're nice," he said. "I like you!" Conscientiously then he resumed his reading. "No--Pleurodira--have yet been found," he began. "Yes--isn't that too bad?" sighed little Eve Edgarton. "It doesn't matter personally to me," admitted Barton. Hastily he moved on to the next sentence. "The Amphichelydia--are known there by only the genus Baena," he read. "Two described species: B. undata and B. arenosa, to which was added B. hebraica and B. ponderosa--" Petulantly he slammed the whole handful of papers to the floor. "Eve!" he stammered. "I can't stand it! I tell you--I just can't stand it! Take my attic if you want to! Or my cellar! Or my garage! Or anything else of mine in the world that you have any fancy for! But for Heaven's sake--" With extraordinarily dilated eyes Eve Edgarton stared out at him from her white pillows. "Why--why, if it makes you feel like that--just to read it," she reproached him mournfully, "how do you suppose it makes me feel to have to write it? All you have to do--is to read it," she said. "But I? I have to write it!" "But--why do you have to write it?" gasped Barton.