ant, Brim."

Mr. Brimberly stared and felt for his whisker.

"Note dominant," he murmured; "I don't think my song has anything of
that sort--"

"Oh, well, just whistle a couple o' bars."

"Bars," said Mr. Brimberly, shaking his head, "bars, sir, is things
wherewith I do not 'old; bars are the 'aunt of the 'umble 'erd, sir--"

"No, no, Brim," explained Mr. Stevens, "Jenk merely means you to 'um the
air."

"Ah, to be sure, now I appre'end! I'll 'um you the hair with pleasure."

Mr. Brimberly cleared his throat vigorously and thereafter emitted
certain rumbling noises, whereat Mr. Jenkins cocked a knowing head.

"C sharp, I think?" he announced.

"Not much, Jenk!" said Mr. Stevens decidedly, "it was D flat--as flat a
D as ever I heard!"

"It was C!" Mr. Jenkins said, "I appeal to Brim."

"Well," said Mr. Brimberly ponderously, "I'm reether inclined to think I
made it a D--if it wasn't D it was F nat'ral. But if it's all the same
to you, I'll accompany myself at the piano-forty."

"What," exclaimed Mr. Stevens, emptying and refilling his glass, seeing
which Mr. Jenkins did the same, "what--do you play, Brim?"

"By hear, sir--only by hear," said Mr. Brimberly modestly, as, having
placed bottle and glass upon the piano within convenient reach, he
seated himself upon the stool, struck three or four stumbling chords and
then, vamping an accompaniment a trifle monotonous as to bass, burst
forth into song:

"It was a rich merchant that in London did dwell,
He had but one daughter, a beautiful gell,
Which her name it was Dinah, scarce sixteen years old,
She'd a very large fortune in silver and gold."

Chorus:

"Ri tooral ri tooral ri tooral i-day,
Ri tooral ri tooral ri tooral i-day."

It was now that Mr. Ravenslee, his rough clothes replaced by immaculate
attire, entered unostentatiously, and, wholly unobserved by the company,
seated himself and lounged there while Mr. Brimberly sang blithely on:

"As Dinah was a-walking in her garden one day,
Her father came to her and thus he did say:
'Come wed yourself, Dinah, to your nearest of kin,
Or you shan't have the benefit of one single pin!'"

"Ri tooral ri too--"

Here Mr. Jenkins, chancing to catch sight of that unobtrusive figure,
let fall his banjo with a clatter, whereupon Mr. Brimberly glancing
around, stopped short in the middle of a note, and sat open-mouthed,
staring at his master.

"Enjoying a musical evening, Brimberly?"

Mr. Brimberly