n at Ealing West," said Mr. Peters, moistening the point of his
pencil, "he wrote you letters proposing marriage?"

"No, no, no!"

"At any rate," said Mr. Peters, disappointed but hopeful, "he made love
to you before witnesses?"

"Never! Never! There is no man at Ealing West! There never was a man at
Ealing West!"

It was at this point that Jno. Peters began for the first time to
entertain serious doubts of the girl's mental balance. The most
elementary acquaintance with the latest census told him that there were
any number of men at Ealing West. The place was full of them. Would a
sane woman have made an assertion to the contrary? He thought not, and
he was glad that he had the revolver with him. She had done nothing as
yet actively violent, but it was nice to feel prepared. He took it out
and laid it nonchalantly in his lap.

The sight of the weapon acted on Billie electrically. She flung out her
hands, in a gesture of passionate appeal, and played her last card.

"I love _you_!" she cried. She wished she could have remembered his
first name. It would have rounded off the sentence neatly. In such a
moment she could hardly call him "Mr. Peters." "You are the only man I
love."

"My gracious goodness!" ejaculated Mr. Peters, and nearly fell over
backwards. To a naturally shy man this sudden and wholly unexpected
declaration was disconcerting; and the clerk was, moreover, engaged. He
blushed violently. And yet, even in that moment of consternation, he
could not check a certain thrill. No man thinks he is as plain as he
really is, but Jno. Peters had always come fairly near to a correct
estimate of his charms, and it had always seemed to him, that, in
inducing his fiancee to accept him, he had gone some. He now began to
wonder if he were not really rather a devil of a chap after all. There
must be precious few men going about capable of inspiring devotion like
this on the strength of about six and a half minutes casual
conversation.

Calmer thoughts succeeded this little flicker of complacency. The girl
was mad. That was the fact of the matter. He got up and began to edge
towards the door. Mr. Samuel would be returning shortly, and he ought to
be warned.

"So that's all right, isn't it!" said Billie.

"Oh, quite, quite!" said Mr. Peters. "Er--Thank you very much!"

"I thought you would be pleased," said Billie, relieved but puzzled. For
a man of volcanic passions, as Sam Marlowe had described him, he seemed