sell, and it was his business to see that they satisfied
the buyer. In this case the goods were represented by sixty-nine inches
of good-looking, well-dressed man, and it was rather important that he
should present the best face of the article to the purchaser. It was
almost as important that the sale should be a quick one. Mr. Stepney
lived from week to week. What might happen next year seldom interested
him, therefore his courting must be rapid.

He told the story of his life at lunch, a story liable to move a
tender-hearted woman to at least a sympathetic interest. The story of
his life varied also with the audience. In this case, it was designed
for one whom he knew had had a hard struggle, whose father had been
heavily in debt, and who had tasted some of the bitterness of defeat.
Jean had given him a very precise story of the girl's career, and Mr.
Marcus Stepney adapted it for his own purpose.

"Why, your life has almost run parallel with mine," said Lydia.

"I hope it may continue," said Mr. Stepney not without a touch of
sadness in his voice. "I am a very lonely man--I have no friends except
the acquaintances one can pick up at night clubs, and the places where
the smart people go in the season, and there is an artificiality about
society friends which rather depresses me."

"I feel that, too," said the sympathetic Lydia.

"If I could only settle down!" he said, shaking his head. "A little
house in the country, a few horses, a few cows, a woman who understood
me...."

A false move this.

"And a few pet chickens to follow you about?" she laughed. "No, it
doesn't sound quite like you, Mr. Stepney."

He lowered his eyes.

"I am sorry you think that," he said. "All the world thinks that I'm a
gadabout, an idler, with no interest in existence, except the pleasure I
can extract."

"And a jolly good existence, too," said Lydia briskly. She had detected
a note of sentiment creeping into the conversation, and had slain it
with the most effective weapon in woman's armoury.

"And now tell me all about the great Moorish Pretender who is staying at
your hotel--I caught a glimpse of him on the promenade--and there was a
lot about him in the paper."

Mr. Stepney sighed and related all that he knew of the redoubtable Muley
Hafiz on the way to the rooms. Muley Hafiz was being lionised in France
just then, to the annoyance of the Spanish authorities, who had put a
price on his head.

Lydia showed much more inter