"Read it." Slowly and distinctly she read:-- "'The cropsticks of flamingo bicrastus quack.'" The doctor frowned, laid his hat on the table, and seating himself took the paper from Cicely Drane.
"This is strange," said he.

"It does seem to be 'cropsticks of flamingo,' but what can that mean ?" "That is what I came to ask you," said she.

"I have been puzzling over it a good while, and I supposed, of course, you would know what it is." "But I do not," said the doctor.

"It is often very hard for me to read my own writing, and this was written two years ago.

You can leave this sheet with me, and this evening I will look over it and try to make something out of it." Cicely Drane was methodical in her ways; she could not properly go on with the rest of her work without this page, and so she told the doctor.
"Oh, never mind any more work for today," said he.