arded as a skid-collision-and-mutilation-provoking
speed, that a protest from Anna-Rose conveyed to Mr. Twist where
they were heading for.

"An hotel called Ritz sounds very expensive," she said. "I've heard
Uncle Arthur talk of one there is in London and one there is in Paris,
and he said that only damned American millionaires could afford to stay
in them. Anna-Felicitas and me aren't American millionaires--"

"Or damned," put in Anna-Felicitas.

"--but quite the contrary," said Anna-Rose, "hadn't you better take us
somewhere else?"

"Somewhere like where the Brontes stayed in London," said Anna-Felicitas
harping on this idea. "Where cheapness is combined with historical
associations."

"Oh Lord, it don't matter," said Mr. Twist, who for the first time in
their friendship seemed ruffled.

"Indeed it does," said Anna-Rose anxiously.

"You forget we've got to husband our resources," said Anna-Felicitas.

"You mustn't run away with the idea that because we've got L200 we're
the same as millionaires," said Anna-Rose.

"Uncle Arthur," said Anna-Felicitas, "frequently told us that L200 is a
very vast sum; but he equally frequently told us that it isn't."

"It was when he was talking about having given to us that he said it was
such a lot," said Anna-Rose.

"He said that as long as we had it we would be rich," said
Anna-Felicitas, "but directly we hadn't it we would be poor."

"So we'd rather not go to the Ritz, please," said Anna-Rose, "if you
don't mind."

The taxi was stopped, and Mr. Twist got out and consulted the driver.
The thought of his Uncle Charles as a temporary refuge for the twins
floated across his brain, but was rejected because Uncle Charles would
speak to no woman under fifty except from his pulpit, and approached
those he did speak to with caution till they were sixty. He regarded
them as one of the chief causes of modern unrest. He liked them so much
that he hated them. He could practise abstinence, but not temperance.
Uncle Charles was no good as a refuge.

"Well now, see here," said the driver at last, after Mr. Twist had
rejected such varied suggestions of something small and quiet as the
Waldorf-Astoria, the Plaza and the Biltmore, "you tell me where you want
to go to and I'll take you there."

"I want to go to the place your mother would stay in if she came up for
a day or two from the country," said Mr. Twist helplessly.

"Get right in then, and I'll take you back to the Ritz," sa