The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Bill-Toppers, by Andre Castaigne

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Title: The Bill-Toppers

Author: Andre Castaigne

Release Date: August 9, 2008 [EBook #26242]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

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[Illustration: Poland, the Parisienne. Page 123. Frontispiece.]

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THE BILL-TOPPERS

By
ANDRE CASTAIGNE

With Illustrations
BY THE AUTHOR

A. L. BURT COMPANY
Publishers--New York

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Copyright, 1909
The Bobbs-Merrill Company

August

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TO MY LITTLE FRIENDS
THE STARS!

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THE BILL-TOPPERS

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THE BILL-TOPPERS

OVERTURE

All around stretched the great blue sky and the blue sea of the Gulf of
Bengal.

Mrs. Clifton lay dozing at full length on a pillowed bench and her husband
sat near her and followed his Lily, his daughter, with his eyes: his Lily,
eight years old, "that high," waving among the passengers the white coral
necklace which Pa had bought her on leaving Australia; his Lily, his star,
his New Zealander on Wheels! His Lily who had had such successes at
Melbourne, at Sidney: bouquets, tons and cart-loads of bouquets! And the
past would be nothing compared with the future, with the astounding tricks
which he was inventing for his Lily. The mere sight of her raised his
enthusiasm to boiling-point. And he was going to show them, in Calcutta
and elsewhere, if they knew how to make stars in New Zealand or if they
were only fit for raising mutton.

Clifton was an artist, an "artiste," a born artiste: starting as a mere
clerk in an office, he had become an amateur cyclist and then a
professional on the track. He married an Englishwoman at Wellington and,
at Lily's birth, decided upon a career: the stage