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There was a pause, and Miss Mapp knew that she had put Isabel in a hole. If she successfully tried to get somebody else, Miss Mapp might find she could squeeze it in, and there would be nine. If she failed to get someone else, and Miss Mapp couldn’t squeeze it in, then there would be seven…. Isabel wouldn’t have a tranquil moment all day.

“Ah, do squeeze it in,” she said in those horrid wheedling tones which for some reason Major Flint found so attractive. That was one of the weak points about him, and there were many, many others. But that was among those which Miss Mapp found it difficult to condone.

“If I possibly can,” said Miss Mapp. “But at this late hour​—​Good-bye, dear, or only au reservoir, we hope.”

She heard Isabel’s polite laugh at this nearly new and ​delicious Malaprop before she rang off. Isabel collected malaprops and wrote them out in a note book. If you reversed the note-book and began at the other end, you would find the collection of Spoonerisms, which were very amusing, too.