ually been told yet, but
when he is he'll be as pleased as everyone else--you ought to be simply
overjoyed to find that men like Doyle are inviting the Lord-Lieutenant
down to unveil their statue. It shows that they're getting steadily
loyaler and loyaler. Instead of exulting in the fact you start sneering
in a cynical and altogether disgusting way."

"I don't believe much in Doyle's loyalty," said the Major.

"Fortunately," said Dr. O'Grady, "Doyle thoroughly believes in yours. He
agrees with me that you are the first man who ought to be asked to join
the reception committee. You can't possibly refuse."

"I would refuse if I thought there was the slightest chance of the
Lord-Lieutenant coming. Do you think I want to stand about in a tall hat
along with half the blackguards in town?"

"Mrs. Gregg is going to present a bouquet," said Dr. O'Grady.

"Looking like a fool in the middle of the street, while you play silly
tricks with a statue?"

"You won't be asked to do all that," said Dr. O'Grady.

"I am being asked. You're asking me this minute, and if I thought it
would come off----"

"As you think it won't you may as well join the committee."

"I won't be secretary," said the Major, "and I won't have hand, act, or
part, in asking the Lord-Lieutenant to come here. We don't want him, for
one thing."

"You'll not be asked so much as to sign a paper," said Dr. O'Grady. "If
your name is required at the bottom of any document I'll write it for
you myself."

"I wish to goodness," said the Major, "that Billing--if that's the man's
name--had stayed in America attending to his own business, whatever
it is, instead of coming here and starting all this fuss. There'll be
trouble before you've done, O'Grady, more trouble than you care for. I
wish to God it was all well over."

Nothing is more gratifying to the prophet of evil than the fulfilment
of his own prediction. When the fulfilment follows hard on the prophecy,
when not more than half an hour separates them, the prophet ought to be
a very happy man. This was Major Kent's case. He foretold trouble of the
most exasperating kind for Dr. O'Grady, and he was immediately justified
by the event. Unfortunately he did not expect an immediate fulfilment
of his words. Therefore he turned round in his chair and went to sleep
again when the doctor left him. If he had been sanguine enough to expect
that the doctor would be entangled in embarrassments at once, he would
probably