ies
sitting with men at little tables by the window--"I thinks as how you
gets more real happiness in a quiet village pub, and the beer is
cheaper, and--gorblimey!"

He ran his finger between his stringy neck and the frayed stand-up
collar that would have sawn his head off but for the toughness of his
hide. To do Paul honour he had arrayed himself in his best--a
wondrously cut and heavily-braided morning coat and lavender-coloured
trousers of eccentric shape, and a funny little billycock hat too small
for him, and a thunder-and-lightning necktie, all of which he had
purchased nearly twenty years ago to grace a certain, wedding a. which
he had been best man. Since then he had worn the Nessus shirt of a
costume not more than half-a-dozen times. The twisted, bright-eyed
little man, so obviously ill at ease in his amazing garb, and the
beautiful youth, debonair in his well-fitting blue serge, formed a
queer contrast.

"Don't you never long for the wind of God and the smell of the rain?"
asked Barney Bill.

"I haven't the time," said Paul. "I'm busy all day long."

"Well, well," said Barney Bill, "the fellow wasn't far wrong who said
it takes all sorts to make a world. There are some as likes electric
light and some as likes the stars. Gimme the stars." And in his
countryman's way he set the beer in his tankard swirling round and
round before he put it again to his lips.

Paul sipped his beer reflectively. "You may find happiness and peace of
soul under the stars," said he, sagely, "and if I were a free agent I'd
join you tomorrow. But you can't find fame. You can't rise to great
things. I want to--well, I don't quite know what I want to do," he
laughed, "but it's something big."

"Yuss, my boy," said Barney Bill. "I understand. You was always like
that. You haven't come any nearer finding your 'igh-born
parents?"--there was a twinkle in his eyes--"'ave yer?"

"I'm not going to bother any more about them, whoever they are," said
Paul, lighting a cigarette. "When I was a kid I used to dream that they
would find me and do everything for me. Now I'm a man with experience
of life, I find that I've got to do everything for myself. And by
George!"--he thumped the bar and smiled the radiant smile of the young
Apollo--"I'm going to do it."

Barney Bill took off his Luke's iron crown of a billycock hat and
scratched his cropped and grizzled head. "How old are you, sonny?"

"Nearly nineteen," said Paul.

"By Gosh!" said