etend to be a good man. I doubt if the pretence would be of
any use were I to try: I am not a sufficiently good actor. I said to
myself, as I took off my boots in the study, preparatory to retiring to
my bedroom--"Number Eighty-eight is evidently not in a frame of mind
to listen to my story. It will be better to let him shout himself cool;
after which he will return to his own flat, bathe his eye, and obtain
some refreshing sleep. In the morning, when we shall probably meet as
usual on our way to Fleet Street, I will refer to the incident casually,
and sympathize with him. I will suggest to him the truth--that in all
probability some fellow-tenant, irritated also by the noise, had
aimed coal at the Waits, hitting him instead by a regrettable but pure
accident. With tact I may even be able to make him see the humour of the
incident. Later on, in March or April, choosing my moment with judgment,
I will, perhaps, confess that I was that fellow-tenant, and over a
friendly brandy-and-soda we will laugh the whole trouble away."

As a matter of fact, that is what happened. Said number Eighty-eight--he
was a big man, as good a fellow at heart as ever lived, but
impulsive--"Damned lucky for you, old man, you did not tell me at the
time."

"I felt," I replied, "instinctively that it was a case for delay."

There are times when one should control one's passion for candour; and
as I was saying, Christmas waits excite no emotion in my breast save
that of irritation. But I have known "Hark, the herald angels sing,"
wheezily chanted by fog-filled throats, and accompanied, hopelessly out
of tune, by a cornet and a flute, bring a great look of gladness to a
work-worn face. To her it was a message of hope and love, making
the hard life taste sweet. The mere thought of family gatherings, so
customary at Christmas time, bores us superior people; but I think of an
incident told me by a certain man, a friend of mine. One Christmas, my
friend, visiting in the country, came face to face with a woman whom in
town he had often met amid very different surroundings. The door of
the little farmhouse was open; she and an older woman were ironing at
a table, and as her soft white hands passed to and fro, folding and
smoothing the rumpled heap, she laughed and talked, concerning simple
homely things. My friend's shadow fell across her work, and she looking
up, their eyes met; but her face said plainly, "I do not know you here,
and here you do not kn