."

"I'll ring for my landlady and have the bottle brought up," said Horace.
"Perhaps that will satisfy you? Stay, you'd better not let her see you."

"I will render myself invisible," said the Jinnee, suiting the action to
his words. "But beware lest thou play me false," his voice continued,
"for I shall hear thee!"

"So you've come in, Mr. Ventimore?" said Mrs. Rapkin, as she entered.
"And without the furrin gentleman? I _was_ surprised, and so was Rapkin
the same, to see you ridin' off this morning in the gorgious chariot and
'osses, and dressed up that lovely! 'Depend upon it,' I says to Rapkin,
I says, 'depend upon it, Mr. Ventimore'll be sent for to Buckinham
Pallis, if it ain't Windsor Castle!"

"Never mind that now," said Horace, impatiently; "I want that brass
bottle I bought the other day. Bring it up at once, please."

"I thought you said the other day you never wanted to set eyes on it
again, and I was to do as I pleased with it, sir?"

"Well, I've changed my mind, so let me have it, quick."

"I'm sure I'm very sorry, sir, but that you can't, because Rapkin, not
wishful to have the place lumbered up with rubbish, disposed of it on'y
last night to a gentleman as keeps a rag and bone emporium off the
Bridge Road, and 'alf-a-crown was the most he'd give for it, sir."

"Give me his name," said Horace.

"Dilger, sir--Emanuel Dilger. When Rapkin comes in I'm sure he'd go
round with pleasure, and see about it, if required."

"I'll go round myself," said Horace. "It's all right, Mrs. Rapkin, quite
a natural mistake on your part, but--but I happen to want the bottle
again. You needn't stay."

"O thou smooth-faced and double-tongued one!" said the Jinnee, after she
had gone, as he reappeared to view. "Did I not foresee that thou wouldst
deal crookedly? Restore unto me my bottle!"

"I'll go and get it at once," said Horace; "I shan't be five minutes."
And he prepared to go.

"Thou shalt not leave this house," cried Fakrash, "for I perceive
plainly that this is but a device of thine to escape and betray me to
the Press Devil!"

"If you can't see," said Horace, angrily, "that I'm quite as anxious to
see you safely back in that confounded bottle as ever you can be to get
there, you must be pretty dense! _Can't_ you understand? The bottle's
sold, and I can't buy it back without going out. Don't be so infernally
unreasonable!"

"Go, then," said the Jinnee, "and I will await thy return here. But know
this: