up to my
house. He has stood by Harold--well, like a Christian!'

'Or a Hindu,' the Maharajah corrected, smiling.

'And how have you been all this time, dear Lady Georgina?' I asked,
hardly daring to inquire about what was nearest to my soul--Harold.

The cantankerous old lady knitted her brows in a familiar fashion. 'Oh,
my dear, don't ask: I haven't known a happy hour since you left me in
Switzerland. Lois, I shall never be happy again without you! It would
pay me to give you a retaining fee of a thousand a year--honour bright,
it would, I assure you. What I've suffered from the Gretchens since
you've been in the East has only been equalled by what I've suffered
from the Mary Annes and the Celestines. Not a hair left on my scalp; not
one hair, I declare to you. They've made my head into a _tabula rasa_
for the various restorers. George R. Sims and Mrs. S. A. Allen are going
to fight it out between them. My dear, I wish _you_ could take my maid's
place; I've always said----'

I finished the speech for her. 'A lady can do better whatever she turns
her hand to than any of these hussies.'

She nodded. 'And why? Because her hands _are_ hands; while as for the
Gretchens and the Mary Annes, "paws" is the only word one can honestly
apply to them. Then, on top of it all comes this trouble about Harold.
So distressing, isn't it? You see, at the point which the matter has
reached, it's simply impossible to save Harold's reputation without
wrecking Southminster's. Pretty position that for a respectable family!
The Ashursts hitherto have been _quite_ respectable: a co-respondent or
two, perhaps, but never anything serious. Now, either Southminster sends
Harold to prison, or Harold sends Southminster. There's a nice sort of
dilemma! I always knew Kynaston's boys were born fools; but to find
they're born knaves, too, is hard on an old woman in her hairless
dotage. However, _you've_ come, my child, and _you'll_ soon set things
right. You're the one person on earth I can trust in this matter.'

Harold go to prison! My head reeled at the thought. I staggered out into
the open air, and took my seat mechanically in the Maharajah's carriage.
All London swam before me. After so many months' absence, the
polychromatic decorations of our English streets, looming up through the
smoke, seemed both strange and familiar. I drove through the first half
mile with a vague consciousness that Lipton's tea is the perfection of
cocoa and matchle