don't know of a single girl in this neighborhood who
could come in and help."

"I have it. I can save the situation. I have an idea. On the 16th
inst., at Jawbones, Halfpenny Hole, Surrey, Mr. Luke Sharper, of an
idea. Both doing well."

"Would you mind telling me what you are talking about?"

"I'm talking about old Vessunt. He's a foreman. Up at the factory.
Fine old chap. Religious but quite honest. He's got a daughter, Effie.
Very superior girl. And she's looking for a job. I can get her for you
to-morrow morning. Effie Vessunt. Rather bright and sparkling, what?"

"At any rate, I can see her."

"You can, even with the naked eye. But I say, you know, she really is
rather superior. She'll have to have her meals with us."

"If I engage her, she will feed in the kitchen."

"Mabel, must you always disagree with me? Have you no spirit of
compromise? Can't you meet me half way in a little thing like this?"

"If I met you half way the girl would have her meals in the passage.
And I don't suppose she'd like it, and anyhow she'd be in everybody's
way."

"And this when I've just been of real use to you."

"So you ought to be. You were indirectly responsible for the accident
that gave Kate the swollen knee. It was your wretched old push-bike
that she fell over."

Luke wagged his ears. "Indirectly," he said. "There are many of us in
it indirectly. Dunlop, for instance. Niggers in a rubber plantation.
Factories in Coventry. A retail shop in High Holborn. And me. All
working together. Combining and elaborating in order to give Dot a
nasty one on the knee-cap. It's rather a great thought when you come
to think it out that way."

"I can't see why you want to ride that old job-lot of scrap-iron at
all. You might just as well go by train, now that the new line is
opened. All my friends do it. Why can't you go by train?"

"I believe I know the answer to that one. Don't tell me. I'll go
upstairs and think it out."

He went up to the frowsty study-bedroom, and sat down at his table.
Mechanically he drew from his pocket the sheet of thirty stamps with
which, after a few disparaging remarks, the lady at the post-office
had supplied him. He spread them out before him. Thirty stamps. Thirty
letters to Jona. He felt inclined to kiss every one of them.

He did not do so. He reflected that in the ordinary course of affixing
them to the envelope he would put them to his lips in any case. It was
not sense to do the same piece