ng borrowed a sum sufficient for the purpose), Maddox, who
controlled its course, and Rankin, whose brilliance made it twinkle so
brightly in the firmament. With them, but emphatically not of them,
was Horace Jewdwine, of Lazarus, who had come up from Oxford to join
the staff of _The Museion_.

Jewdwine and Mackinnon, both secure of a position and a salary, looked
solemn and a little anxious; but the men of _The Planet_, having
formed themselves into a sort of unlimited liability company, and
started a brand new "weekly" of their own (upon no sort of security
beyond their bare brains) were as persons without a single care, worry
or responsibility. They were exchanging ideas in an off-hand and
light-hearted manner, the only stipulation being that the ideas must
be new; for, by some unwritten law of the club, the conversational
currency was liable at any moment to be called in.

This evening, however, they had hit on a topic almost virgin from the
mint.

"S.K.R.? _Who_ is he? _What_ is he?" said Mackinnon.

"I can't tell you what he _is_; but I can pretty soon tell you what
he's not," said Stables. He was a very young man with a white face and
red eyelids, who looked as if he sat up all night and went to bed in
the day-time, as indeed he generally did.

"_Omnis negatio est determinatio_," murmured Jewdwine, without looking
up from the letter he was trying to write.

"What has he done?" persisted Mackinnon.

"He's done a great many remarkable things," said Rankin; "things
almost as remarkable as himself."

"Who unearthed him?"

"I did," said Rankin, so complacently that the deep lines relaxed
round the five copper-coloured bosses that were his chin and cheeks
and brow. (The rest of Rankin's face was spectacles and moustache.)

"Oh, did you?" said Maddox. Maddox was a short man with large
shoulders; heavy browed, heavy jowled, heavy moustached. Maddox's
appearance belied him; he looked British when he was half Celt; he
struck you as overbearing when he was only top-heavy; he spoke as if
he was angry when he was only in fun, as you could see by his eyes.
Little babyish blue eyes they were with curly corners, a gay light in
the sombre truculence of his face. They looked cautiously round.

"I can tell you a little tale about S.K.R. You know the last time
Smythe was ill--?"

"You mean drunk."

"Well--temporarily extinguished. S.K.R., who knows his music-halls,
was offered Smythe's berth. We delicately intimated