into a Nut after all. It was a
disquieting symptom that he left all the parcels in charge of the cloak-
room attendant.

"We shall be getting more parcels presently," he said, "so we need not
collect these till we have finished our shopping."

His aunt was doubtfully appeased; some of the pleasure and excitement of
a shopping expedition seemed to evaporate when one was deprived of
immediate personal contact with one's purchases.

"I'm going to look at those napkins again," she said, as they descended
the stairs to the ground floor. "You need not come," she added, as the
dreaming look in the boy's eyes changed for a moment into one of mute
protest, "you can meet me afterwards in the cutlery department; I've just
remembered that I haven't a corkscrew in the house that can be depended
on."

Cyprian was not to be found in the cutlery department when his aunt in
due course arrived there, but in the crush and bustle of anxious shoppers
and busy attendants it was an easy matter to miss anyone. It was in the
leather goods department some quarter of an hour later that Adela
Chemping caught sight of her nephew, separated from her by a rampart of
suit-cases and portmanteaux and hemmed in by the jostling crush of human
beings that now invaded every corner of the great shopping emporium. She
was just in time to witness a pardonable but rather embarrassing mistake
on the part of a lady who had wriggled her way with unstayable
determination towards the bareheaded Cyprian, and was now breathlessly
demanding the sale price of a handbag which had taken her fancy.

"There now," exclaimed Adela to herself, "she takes him for one of the
shop assistants because he hasn't got a hat on. I wonder it hasn't
happened before."

Perhaps it had. Cyprian, at any rate, seemed neither startled nor
embarrassed by the error into which the good lady had fallen. Examining
the ticket on the bag, he announced in a clear, dispassionate voice:

"Black seal, thirty-four shillings, marked down to twenty-eight. As a
matter of fact, we are clearing them out at a special reduction price of
twenty-six shillings. They are going off rather fast."

"I'll take it," said the lady, eagerly digging some coins out of her
purse.

"Will you take it as it is?" asked Cyprian; "it will be a matter of a few
minutes to get it wrapped up, there is such a crush."

"Never mind, I'll take it as it is," said the purchaser, clutching her
treasure and counting the m