roffered hand and shook it warmly. "It would be the best
joke of all," he said, turning away.

"What would?"

The soldier confronted her again.

"For old Benn to come round here one evening and find me landlord. Think
it over."

Mrs. Waters met his gaze soberly. "I'll think it over when you have
gone," she said, softly. "Now go."

THE NEST EGG

[Illustration: "The Nest Egg."]

"Artfulness," said the night-watch-man, smoking placidly, "is a gift; but
it don't pay always. I've met some artful ones in my time--plenty of
'em; but I can't truthfully say as 'ow any of them was the better for
meeting me."

He rose slowly from the packing-case on which he had been sitting and,
stamping down the point of a rusty nail with his heel, resumed his seat,
remarking that he had endured it for some time under the impression that
it was only a splinter.

"I've surprised more than one in my time," he continued, slowly. "When I
met one of these 'ere artful ones I used fust of all to pretend to be
more stupid than wot I really am."

He stopped and stared fixedly.

"More stupid than I looked," he said. He stopped again.

"More stupid than wot they thought I looked," he said, speaking with
marked deliberation. And I'd let 'em go on and on until I thought I had
'ad about enough, and then turn round on 'em. Nobody ever got the better
o' me except my wife, and that was only before we was married. Two
nights arterwards she found a fish-hook in my trouser-pocket, and arter
that I could ha' left untold gold there--if I'd ha' had it. It spoilt
wot some people call the honey-moon, but it paid in the long run.

One o' the worst things a man can do is to take up artfulness all of a
sudden. I never knew it to answer yet, and I can tell you of a case
that'll prove my words true.

It's some years ago now, and the chap it 'appened to was a young man, a
shipmate o' mine, named Charlie Tagg. Very steady young chap he was, too
steady for most of 'em. That's 'ow it was me and 'im got to be such
pals.

He'd been saving up for years to get married, and all the advice we could
give 'im didn't 'ave any effect. He saved up nearly every penny of 'is
money and gave it to his gal to keep for 'im, and the time I'm speaking
of she'd got seventy-two pounds of 'is and seventeen-and-six of 'er own
to set up house-keeping with.

Then a thing happened that I've known to 'appen to sailormen afore. At
Sydney 'e got silly on another