with an air of great explicitness, "I GOT
the secret."

"Yes."

"But I don't want the name of Butteridge to appear--see? I been thinking
that over."

"A little delicacy?"

"Exactly. You buy the secret--leastways, I give it you--from
Bearer--see?"

His voice failed him a little, and the stare continued. "I want to do
the thing Enonymously. See?"

Still staring. Bert drifted on like a swimmer caught by a current. "Fact
is, I'm going to edop' the name of Smallways. I don't want no title of
Baron; I've altered my mind. And I want the money quiet-like. I want the
hundred thousand pounds paid into benks--thirty thousand into the London
and County Benk Branch at Bun Hill in Kent directly I 'and over the
plans; twenty thousand into the Benk of England; 'arf the rest into a
good French bank, the other 'arf the German National Bank, see? I want
it put there, right away. I don't want it put in the name of Butteridge.
I want it put in the name of Albert Peter Smallways; that's the name I'm
going to edop'. That's condition one."

"Go on!" said the secretary.

"The nex condition," said Bert, "is that you don't make any inquiries
as to title. I mean what English gentlemen do when they sell or let you
land. You don't arst 'ow I got it. See? 'Ere I am--I deliver you the
goods--that's all right. Some people 'ave the cheek to say this isn't my
invention, see? It is, you know--THAT'S all right; but I don't want that
gone into. I want a fair and square agreement saying that's all right.
See?"

His "See?" faded into a profound silence.

The secretary sighed at last, leant back in his chair and produced a
tooth-pick, and used it, to assist his meditation on Bert's case. "What
was that name?" he asked at last, putting away the tooth-pick; "I must
write it down."

"Albert Peter Smallways," said Bert, in a mild tone.

The secretary wrote it down, after a little difficulty about the
spelling because of the different names of the letters of the alphabet
in the two languages.

"And now, Mr. Schmallvays," he said at last, leaning back and resuming
the stare, "tell me: how did you ket hold of Mister Pooterage's
balloon?"

7

When at last the Graf von Winterfold left Bert Smallways, he left him in
an extremely deflated condition, with all his little story told.

He had, as people say, made a clean breast of it. He had been pursued
into details. He had had to explain the blue suit, the sandals, the
Desert Dervishes--everything.