, and he was young. Wasn't quite bad, but he couldn't
hold his own with older fellows.

"He got among a set that had suppers in their rooms, and gambled a
bit, and he lost and borrowed, and--in fact, was stone broke.

"It's not very pleasant for a fellow to sit in his room a week before
Christmas, and know that he may be cashiered before the holidays, and
all through his own fault.

"If it were only himself, why, he might take his licking and go to the
Colonies, but it was hard--on his mother--it's always going, out, this
pipe!--when he was her only son, and she rather--believed in him.

"Didn't sleep much that night--told me himself afterwards--and he
concluded that the best way out was to buy opium in the city next day,
and take it--pretty stiff dose, you know--next night.

"Cowardly rather, of course, but it might be easier for the mater down
in Devon--his mother, I mean--did I say he was Devon?--same county
as myself--affair would be hushed up, and she would have--his memory
clean.

"As it happened, though, he didn't buy any opium next day--didn't get
the chance; for Perkins came round to his desk, and asked this young
chap to have a bit of dinner with him--aye, and made him come.

[Illustration: "HE HAD THE JOLLIEST LITTLE DINNER READY YOU EVER
SAW."]

"He had the jolliest little dinner ready you ever saw, and he
insisted, on the fellow smoking, though Perkins hates the very smell
of 'baccy, and--well, he got the whole trouble out of him, except the
opium.

"D'y think he lectured and scolded? Not a bit--that's not Perkins--he
left the fool to do his own lecturing, and he did it stiff. I'll
tell you what he said: 'Your health must have been much tried by this
anxiety, so you must go down and spend Christmas with your mother, and
I would venture to suggest that you take her a suitable gift.

"'With regard to your debt, you will allow me,' and Perkins spoke
as if he had been explaining a schedule, 'to take it over, on two
conditions--that you repay me by installments every quarter, and dine
with me every Saturday evening for six months.'

"See what he was after? Wanted to keep--the fellow straight, and
cheer him up; and you've no idea how Perkins came out those
Saturdays--capital stories as ever you heard--and he declared that it
was a pleasure to him.

"'I am rather lonely,' he used to say, 'and it is most kind of a young
man to sit with me.' Kind!"

"What was the upshot with your friend? Did he turn