onic
manner.

"I give you young women up," he murmured. "Yes, I give you up. You're my
enemy. We're at law. And you want to talk confidentially! How can I tell
whether I can let you talk confidentially until I've heard what you're
going to say?"

"Oh! I was only going to say that I'm not really the owner-driver of the
car. I'm personal secretary to Mr. Carrel Quire, and it's really his
car. You see he has three cars, but as there's been such a fuss about
waste lately and he's so prominent in the anti-squandermania campaign,
he prefers to keep only one car in his own name."

"You don't mean to sit there and tell me you're talking about the
Secretary for Foreign Affairs!"

"Yes, of course. Who else? You know he's on the continent at present. He
wouldn't take me with him because he wanted to create an effect of
austerity in Paris--that's what he said; and I must get this accident
affair settled up before he comes back, or he _may_ dismiss me. I don't
think he will, because I'm a cousin of the late Lady Queenie
Paulle--that's how I got the place--but he may. And then where should I
be? I was told you were so kind and nice--that's why I came."

"I am not kind and I am not nice," remarked Mr. Prohack, in an acid
tone, but laughing to himself because the celebrated young statesman,
Mr. Carrel Quire (bald at thirty-five) was precisely one of the
ministers who, during the war, had defied and trampled upon the
Treasury. He now almost demoniacally contemplated the ruin of Mr. Carrel
Quire.

"You have made a serious mistake in coming to me. Unfortunately you
cannot undo it. Be good enough to understand that you have not been
talking confidentially."

Miss Winstock ought to have been intimidated and paralysed by the
menacing manner of the former Terror of the Departments. But she was
not.

"Please, please, Mr. Prohack," she said calmly, "don't talk in that
strain. I distinctly told you I was talking confidentially, and I'm sure
I can rely on you--unless all that I've heard about you is untrue; which
it can't be. I only want matters to be settled quietly, and when Mr.
Quire returns he will pay anything that has to be paid--if it isn't too
much."

"My chauffeur asserts that you have told a most naughty untruth about
the accident. You say that he ran into you, whereas the fact is that he
was nearly standing still while you were going too fast and you skidded
badly into him off the tramlines. And he's found witnesses to pro