you. Why, the
late mayor, who died during his third term of office, had left nearly a
hundred thousand pounds.

For three days Jimmy wrote steadily, doing no less than five articles of
the type which the _Record_ had accepted. One he sent to Dodgson, the
others to papers which Douglas Kelly had mentioned, and then, suddenly,
inspiration seemed to fail him. He could not write a line, could not
even think of a subject; and, for a whole day, he felt something nearly
akin to dismay. If his ideas ran out as quickly as this his prospects
were small indeed; and when the postman brought back two of his
manuscripts, with printed slips conveying the editor's thanks and
regrets, he began to curse his own folly in ever coming home.

That evening, the craving for companionship he had felt in the hotel the
night he landed came back to him again. He had spoken to no one, save
his landlady, for the better part of a week, and the loneliness seemed
unbearable. He sent his supper away, practically untasted, then, without
giving Mrs. Benn a chance to come up and comment on the smallness of his
appetite, took his hat and went out.

It was Early Closing Day, and the High Street was thronged, mainly with
the liberated shop assistants. Jimmy walked slowly, and, owing perhaps
to that fact, he got more than one glance, encouraging him to begin an
acquaintance with young ladies in cheap and showy raiment. But none of
them made the slightest appeal to him. He had no taste for an insipid
flirtation with a girl who would probably play havoc with the aspirates.
He had met many women far less innocent than these, and there had been
more than one passage in his life which he did not recall with pride;
and yet, withal, he was still fastidious where women were concerned. The
only one who had interested him since his return home was the girl whom
he had seen entering the cab in the Strand. Somehow, her face remained
fixed in his memory, and many times since that evening he had found
himself wondering who she was, what her story could be.

He walked down to the bottom of the High Street, to where the trams
swerved round a corner with a whirr and a jolt into the domain of the
next borough council. There was a large public house at that point, with
much brass work and mahogany about its swing doors, and he turned in,
not so much because he wanted anything to drink, but because it seemed
the obvious alternative to the dreariness of his own rooms or the
bo