take my fancy; that's the point! And poor Tom
Cayley! But, mind, I will _not_ be contradicted.'

'I will not contradict your wildest misstatement,' I answered, smiling.

'_And_ your name and address?' I asked, after we had settled
preliminaries.

A faint red spot rose quaintly in the centre of the Cantankerous Old
Lady's sallow cheek. 'My dear,' she murmured, 'my name is the one thing
on earth I'm really ashamed of. My parents chose to inflict upon me the
most odious label that human ingenuity ever devised for a Christian
soul; and I've not had courage enough to burst out and change it.'

A gleam of intuition flashed across me, 'You don't mean to say,' I
exclaimed, 'that you're called Georgina?'

The Cantankerous Old Lady gripped my arm hard. 'What an unusually
intelligent girl!' she broke in. 'How on earth did you guess? It _is_
Georgina.'

'Fellow-feeling,' I answered. 'So is mine, Georgina Lois. But as I quite
agree with you as to the atrocity of such conduct, I have suppressed the
Georgina. It ought to be made penal to send innocent girls into the
world so burdened.'

'My opinion to a T! You are really an exceptionally sensible young
woman. There's my name and address; I start on Monday.'

I glanced at her card. The very copperplate was noisy. 'Lady Georgina
Fawley, 49 Fortescue Crescent, W.'

It had taken us twenty minutes to arrange our protocols. As I walked
off, well pleased, Lady Georgina's friend ran after me quickly.

'You must take care,' she said, in a warning voice. 'You've caught a
Tartar.'

'So I suspect,' I answered. 'But a week in Tartary will be at least an
experience.'

'She has an awful temper.'

'That's nothing. So have I. Appalling, I assure you. And if it comes to
blows, I'm bigger and younger and stronger than she is.'

'Well, I wish you well out of it.'

'Thank you. It is kind of you to give me this warning. But I think I can
take care of myself. I come, you see, of a military family.'

I nodded my thanks, and strolled back to Elsie's. Dear little Elsie was
in transports of surprise when I related my adventure.

'Will you really go? And what will you do, my dear, when you get there?'

'I haven't a notion,' I answered; 'that's where the fun comes in. But,
anyhow, I shall have got there.'

'Oh, Brownie, you might starve!'

'And I might starve in London. In either place, I have only two hands
and one head to help me.'

'But, then, here you are among friends. You might st