waived--" And so on.

"Would you!" commented Mr. Prohack. "I see you doing it. And what's more
I bet you only wrote the letter for the sake of the postscript. Your
tour is not a striking success, and you'll be wanting to do business
with me when you come back, but you won't do it.... And here I am
lecturing Sissie about hardness!"

He rang the bell and told a servant who was a perfect stranger to him to
tell Carthew that he should not want the car.

"May Carthew speak to you, sir?" said the servant returning.

"Carthew may," said he, and the servant thought what an odd gentleman
Mr. Prohack was.

"Well, Carthew," said he, when the chauffeur, perturbed, entered the
room. "This is quite like old times, isn't it? Sit down and have a
cigarette. What's wrong?"

"Well, sir," replied Carthew, after he had lighted the cigarette and
ejected a flake of tobacco into the hearth. "There may be something
wrong or there mayn't, if you understand what I mean. But I'm thinking
of getting married."

"Oh! But what about that wife of yours?"

"Oh! Her! She's dead, all right. I never said anything, feeling as it
might be ashamed of her."

"But I thought you'd done with women!"

"So did I, sir. But the question always is, Have women done with you? I
was helping her to lift pictures down yesterday, and she was standing
on a chair. And something came over me. And there you are before you
know where you are, sir, if you understand what I mean."

"Perfectly, Carthew. But who is it?"

"Machin, sir. To cut a long story short, sir, I'd been thinking about
her for the better part of some time, because of the boy, sir, because
of the boy. She likes him. If it hadn't been for the boy--"

"Careful, Carthew!"

"Well, perhaps you're right, sir. She'd have copped me anyway."

"I congratulate you, Carthew. You've been copped by the best parlourmaid
in London."

"Thank you, sir. I think I'll be getting along, sir."

"Have you told Mrs. Prohack?"

"I thought I'd best leave that to Machin, sir."

Mr. Prohack waved a hand, thoughtful. He heard Carthew leave. He heard
Dr. Veiga arrive, and then he heard Dr. Veiga leaving, and rushed to the
dining-room door.

"Veiga! A moment. Come in. Everything all right?"

"Of course. Absolutely normal. But you know what these young husbands
are. I can't stop unless you're really ill, my friend."

"I'm worse than really ill," said Mr. Prohack, shutting the door. "I'm
really bored. I'm surrounded