sofa. It's important that we should not lose our heads in this crisis.
When you go out to lunch you will buy some foolscap paper and this
afternoon you will make a schedule of the goods, divided according to
the portions of the human frame which they are intended to conceal or
adorn. What are you laughing at, Miss Warburton?"

"You are so amusing, Mr. Prohack."

"I may be amusing, but I am not susceptible to the flattery of giggling.
Endeavour not to treat serious subjects lightly."

"I don't see any boots."

"Neither do I. You will telephone to the bootmaker's, and to my
tailor's; also to Sir Paul Spinner and Messrs. Smathe and Smathe. But
before that I will just dictate a few more letters."

"Certainly."

When he had finished dictating, Mr. Prohack said:

"I shall now get up. Go downstairs and ask Machin--that's the
parlourmaid--to show you the breakfast-room. The breakfast-room is
behind the dining-room, and is so called because it is never employed
for breakfast. It exists in all truly London houses, and is perfectly
useless in all of them except those occupied by dentists, who use it for
their beneficent labours in taking things from, or adding things to, the
bodies of their patients. The breakfast-room in this house will be the
secretary's room--your room if you continue to give me satisfaction.
Remove that typewriting machine from here, and arrange your room
according to your desire.... And I say, Miss Warburton."

"Yes, Mr. Prohack," eagerly responded the secretary, pausing at the
door.

"Yesterday I gave you a brief outline of your duties. But I omitted one
exceedingly important item--almost as important as not falling in love
with my son. You will have to keep on good terms with Machin. Machin is
indispensable and irreplaceable. I could get forty absolutely loyal
secretaries while my wife was unsuccessfully searching for another
Machin."

"I have an infallible way with parlourmaids," said Miss Warburton.

"What is that?"

"I listen to their grievances and to their love-affairs."

Mr. Prohack, though fatigued, felt himself to be inordinately well, and
he divined that this felicity was due to the exercise of dancing on the
previous night, following upon the Turkish bath. He had not felt so well
for many years. He laughed to himself at intervals as he performed his
toilette, and knew not quite why. His secretary was just like a new toy
to him, offering many of the advantages of official life and