augh him
out of it?"

"My dear boy, you might as well try to laugh the hair off his head.
I've tried it a dozen times. After all, the poor dear fellow means no
harm."

"But what does he do now?"

"Oh, don't ask me. According to his own account he's the fastest man
about town--goes to all the shows, hobnobs with all the swells, smokes
furious cigars, and generally `mashes.' But my private notion is he
moons about the streets with the handle of his stick in his mouth and
looks in a few shop windows, and gets half a dozen oysters for supper,
and then goes home to bed. You see he couldn't well get into much
mischief with that collar on. If he went in for turn-downs I'd be
afraid of him."

The bell cut further conversation short, and in another minute Horace
and Reginald were walking arm-in-arm in the street outside.

There was much to talk about, much to lament over, and a little to
rejoice over. Horace felt half guilty as he told his brother of his
good fortune, and the easy quarters into which he had fallen. But
Reginald was in too defiant a mood to share these regrets as much as he
would have done at any other time. As long as Durfy wanted to get rid
of him, so long was he determined to stay where he was, and meanwhile in
young Gedge he had some one to look after, which would make the drudgery
of his daily work tolerable.

Horace did not altogether like it, but he knew it was no use arguing
then on the subject. They mutually agreed to put the best face on
everything before their mother. She was there to meet them at the door,
and it rejoiced her heart to hear their brave talk and the cheery story
of their day's adventures. All day long her heart had gone out to them
in yearnings of prayer and hope and love, and it repaid her a hundred-
fold, this hour of happy meeting, with the sunlight of their faces and
the music of their voices filling her soul.

As soon as supper was over Reginald suggested a precipitate retreat into
the streets, for fear of another neighbourly incursion. Mrs Cruden
laughingly yielded, and the trio had a long walk, heedless where they
went, so long as they were together. They wandered as far as Oxford
Street, looking into what shops were open, and interested still more in
the ever-changing stream of people who even at ten o'clock at night
crowded the pavements. They met no one they knew, not even Booms. But
it mattered little to them that no one noticed them. They had one
an