, but we had no chance
unless we combined. I thought Jack wanted to be feted, and in
consequence I felt absolutely savage with him, while he told me
afterwards that he was simply dragged into the thing by Dennison.
However, I am not altogether sorry that the dinner took place, for
though neither Jack nor I were anything like wily enough to score off
Dennison, we got some rare fun out of him before that evening finished.

Collier, Lambert and Learoyd all came to tell me that I must go to the
dinner before I could be persuaded to have anything to do with it, and
it was really comical to hear why each of them was so keen on the
affair. Collier gloried openly in the fact that it would be a huge
feed, and said he was glad Dennison had engaged Rodoski to play the
fiddle because music gave him a better appetite, and he advised me
strongly not to miss such a good chance of enjoying myself, and thought
me mad to hesitate. Lambert said that Dennison had asked him to
propose Ward's health, and that he hoped his speech--though quite
unprepared--would not be unworthy of the evening. "The dinner itself
will be nothing, just like any other kind of dinner, but don't you miss
it," he concluded, and I felt sure that he had already got his speech
in his pocket. Learoyd begged me not to stay away from a jolly good
rag. "If we can't row, we can rag," he said, and when I told him that
I was sick to death of ragging, he took such a serious view of my case
that I promised that I would go so that I could get rid of him.

There were about fourteen men at the dinner-party, including Ward,
Dennison, Lambert, Learoyd, Collier, Webb, and Bunny Langham, and since
Dennison had taken a free hand in arranging everything, it was a
tremendous affair. I never doubted that his idea was to make Ward and
me look as foolish as possible, for he was the kind of man who was
never really contented unless he was trying to make some one feel
uncomfortable. The whole thing, I knew, was an elaborate joke at our
expense, but I was not going to starve because Nina had fallen into the
"Cher" and Jack had pulled her out, so I set to work to enjoy myself,
though I had to sit next to Dennison. In fact, having once got to the
Sceptre, I think I made more row than any one at dinner, and this must
have disappointed Dennison, who started by saying those half sweet and
half bitter things to me, which I never know how to answer, but which
make me long to put the man who