that there was no use trying to prove Mary Ellen's
relationship. He laughed good-naturedly, and at once offered a
satisfactory explanation of the position.

"Mr. Billing," he said, "insisted on our producing some sort of relative
for the dead General. He wouldn't have given that L100 if we hadn't. Now
what I say is this----"

"You'd say anything," said the Major.

"I'm not talking to you now, Major. I'm talking to Father McCormack,
who's a man of sense, with some knowledge of the world. The way I'm
putting it to him is this: Supposing there was a job going a begging,
a nice comfortable job under the Government, with no particular
duties attached to it, except just to look pleasant and be generally
agreeable--there are such jobs."

"Plenty, plenty," said Father McCormack.

"And they're well paid," said the Major.

"And supposing that you were asked to nominate a man for the post----" Dr.
O'Grady still addressed himself only to Father McCormack. "You might
be, you know. In fact you, and other people in your position often are,
though there's always supposed to be a competitive examination."

"Nobody believes in examinations," said the Major.

"That's exactly what I'm saying," said Dr. O'Grady. "Now what would you
do in a case of the kind? As a matter of fact what do you do? What did
you do when they were appointing a secretary to the Old-Age Pension
Committee?"

"I'd look out for some decent poor fellow," said Father McCormack. "One
that might be wanting something of the kind, a man that nobody would
have anything particular to say against."

"You wouldn't spend a lot of time arguing about whether there ought to
be such a secretary or not?"

"I would not, of course," said Father McCormack. "What would be the use?
If the job's there and a man's wanted I'd have no business talking about
the rights or wrongs of it beyond saying that the salary ought to be a
bit larger."

"Exactly," said Dr. O'Grady. "Now that's just what's happened in this
case. It isn't exactly a job, under the Government, not under our
Government, though it may lead on to something in Bolivia. Here's a dead
General that has to be fitted out with a niece----"

"You said a grand-niece a minute ago," said the Major.

"The principle's the same," said Dr. O'Grady. "What I'm trying to get
you to see is that Mary Ellen may just as well step into the position as
anyone else."

"When you put it that way," said Father McCor-mack, "there's no more