ed awful
dreams of being discovered in a public place with nothing at all upon
our bodies, and have awakened, burning hot with the shame of an enormous
and terrific embarrassment. Being no student of the psychic phenomena of
human slumber I do not know whether this is a subconscious
harking-back to the days of our infancy or whether it is merely a
manifestation to prove the inadvisability of partaking of Welsh rabbits
and lobster salads immediately before retiring. More than once Mr. Leary
had bedreamed thus, but at this moment he realised how much more dread
and distressing may be a dire actuality than a vision conjured up out of
the mysteries of sleep.

One surprised by strangers in a nude or partially nude state may have
any one of a dozen acceptable excuses for being so circumstanced. An
earthquake may have caught one unawares, say; or inopportunely a
bathroom door may have blown open. Once the first shock occasioned by
the untoward appearance of the victim has passed away he is sure of
sympathy. For him pity is promptly engendered and volunteer aid is
enlisted.

But Mr. Leary had a profound conviction that, revealed in this ghastly
plight before the eyes of his fellows, his case would be regarded
differently; that instead of commiseration there would be for him only
the derision which is so humiliating to a sensitive nature. He felt so
undignified, so glaringly conspicuous, so--well, so scandalously
immature. If only it had been an orthodox costume party which Mrs.
Carroway had given, why, then he might have gone as a Roman senator or
as a private chief or an Indian brave or a cavalier. In doublet or jack
boots or war bonnet, in a toga, even, he might have mastered the dilemma
and carried off a dubious situation. But to be adrift in an alien
quarter of a great and heartless city round four o'clock in the morning,
so picturesquely and so unseasonably garbed, and in imminent peril of
detection, was a prospect calculated to fill one with the frenzied
delirium of a nightmare made real. Put yourself in his place, I ask you.

His slippered feet spurned the thin snow as he moved rapidly back toward
the west. Ahead of him he could detect the clumped outlines of the
taxicab, and at the sight of it he quickened to a trot. Once safely
within it he could take stock of things; could map out a campaign of
future action; could think up ways and means of extricating himself from
his present lamentable case with the least possib