illie in a small voice.

"Great Godfrey! Er----?"

"No, only three."

Mr. Bennett sank back on to his pillow with a snort.

"The trouble is," continued Billie, "one does things and doesn't know
how one is going to feel about it afterwards. You can do an awful lot of
thinking afterwards, father."

"I'm doing a lot of thinking now," said Mr. Bennett with austerity. "You
oughtn't to be allowed to go around loose!"

"Well, it doesn't matter. I shall never get engaged again. I shall never
love anyone again."

"Don't tell me you are still in love with this boat man?"

Billie nodded miserably. "I didn't realise it till we came down here.
But, as I sat and watched the rain, it suddenly came over me that I had
thrown away my life's happiness. It was as if I had been offered a
wonderful jewel and had refused it. I seemed to hear a voice reproaching
me and saying, 'You have had your chance. It will never come again!'"

"Don't talk nonsense!" said Mr. Bennett.

Billie stiffened. She had thought she had been talking rather well.

Mr. Bennett was silent for a moment. Then he started up with an
exclamation. The mention of Eustace Hignett had stirred his memory.
"What's young Hignett got wrong with him?" he asked.

"Mumps."

"Mumps! Good God! Not mumps!" Mr. Bennett quailed. "I've never had
mumps! One of the most infectious ... this is awful!... Oh, heavens! Why
did I ever come to this lazar-house!" cried Mr. Bennett, shaken to his
depths.

"There isn't the slightest danger, father, dear. Don't be silly. If I
were you, I should try to get a good sleep. You must be tired after this
morning."

"Sleep! If I only could!" said Mr. Bennett, and did so five minutes
after the door had closed.

He awoke half an hour later with a confused sense that something was
wrong. He had been dreaming that he was walking down Fifth Avenue at the
head of a military brass band, clad only in a bathing suit. As he sat up
in bed, blinking in the dazed fashion of the half-awakened, the band
seemed to be playing still. There was undeniably music in the air. The
room was full of it. It seemed to be coming up through the floor and
rolling about in chunks all round his bed.

Mr. Bennett blinked the last fragments of sleep out of his system, and
became filled with a restless irritability. There was only one
instrument in the house which could create this infernal din--the
orchestrion in the drawing-room, immediately above which, he recalled,
hi