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“Naturally we do, Mapp,” said Irene. “You were down on me sharp enough the other day.”

Miss Mapp wrinkled her face up into the sweetest and extremest smile of which her mobile features were capable.

“Darling, you won’t mind my telling you that just at this moment you are being dummy,” she said, “and so you mustn’t speak a single word. Otherwise there is no ​revoke, even if there was at all, which I consider far from proved yet.”

There was no further proof possible beyond the clear and final evidence of the cards, and since everybody, including Miss Mapp herself, was perfectly well aware that she had revoked, their opponents merely marked up the penalty and the game proceeded. Miss Mapp, of course, following the rule of correct behaviour after revoking, stiffened into a state of offended dignity, and was extremely polite and distant with partner and adversaries alike. This demeanour became even more majestic when in the next hand the Major led out of turn. The moment he had done it, Miss Mapp hurriedly threw a random card out of her hand on to the table, in the hope that Irene, by some strange aberration, would think she had led first.