are certainly solicitors with firmly
established family practices, whose position is more secure than Mr.
Dane-Latimer's. And there are some whose reputation stands higher in
legal circles. But there is probably no solicitor whose name is better
known all over the British Isles than Mr. Dane-Latimer's. He has been
fortunate enough to become a kind of specialist in "Society" cases.
No divorce suit can be regarded as really fashionable unless Mr.
Dane-Latimer is acting in it for plaintiff, defendant, or co-respondent.
A politician who has been libelled goes to Mr. Dane-Latimer for advice.
An actress with a hopeful breach of promise case takes the incriminating
letters to Mr. Dane-Latimer. He knows the facts of nearly every exciting
scandal. He can fill in the gaps which the newspapers necessarily leave
even in stories which spread themselves over columns of print. What is
still better, he can tell stories which never get into the papers at
all, the stories of cases so thrilling that the people concerned settle
them out of court.

It will easily be understood that Mr. Dane-Latimer is an interesting man
to meet and that a good many people welcome the chance of a talk with
him.

Gorman, who has a cultivated taste for gossip, was greatly pleased when
Dane-Latimer sat down beside him one day in the smoking-room of his
club. It was two o'clock, an hour at which the smoking-room is full of
men who have lunched. Gorman knew that Dane-Latimer would not talk in an
interesting way before a large audience, but he hoped to be able to keep
him until most of the other men had left. He beckoned to the waitress
and ordered two coffees and two liqueur brandies. Then he set himself to
be as agreeable as possible to Dane-Latimer.

"Haven't seen you for a long time," he said. "What have you been doing?
Had the flu?"

"Flu! No. Infernally busy, that's all."

"Really," said Gorman. "I should have thought the present slump would
have meant rather a slack time for you. People--I mean the sort of
people whose affairs you manage--can't be going it in quite the old way,
at all events not to the same extent."

Dane-Latimer poured half his brandy into his coffee cup and smiled.
Gorman, who felt it necessary to keep the conversation going, wandered
on.

"But perhaps they are. After all, these war marriages must lead to a
good many divorces, though we don't read about them as much as we used
to. But I dare say they go on just the same and you