etty. They got
on splendidly. Their conversation, at first confined to the weather and
the moving-pictures, rapidly became more intimate. Henry was surprised
to find that she was on the stage, in the chorus. Previous chorus-girls
at the boarding-house had been of a more pronounced type--good girls,
but noisy, and apt to wear beauty-spots. Alice Weston was different.

'I'm rehearsing at present,' she said. 'I'm going out on tour next
month in "The Girl From Brighton". What do you do, Mr Rice?'

Henry paused for a moment before replying. He knew how sensational he
was going to be.

'I'm a detective.'

Usually, when he told girls his profession, squeaks of amazed
admiration greeted him. Now he was chagrined to perceive in the brown
eyes that met his distinct disapproval.

'What's the matter?' he said, a little anxiously, for even at this
early stage in their acquaintance he was conscious of a strong desire
to win her approval. 'Don't you like detectives?'

'I don't know. Somehow I shouldn't have thought you were one.'

This restored Henry's equanimity somewhat. Naturally a detective does
not want to look like a detective and give the whole thing away right
at the start.

'I think--you won't be offended?'

'Go on.'

'I've always looked on it as rather a _sneaky_ job.'

'Sneaky!' moaned Henry.

'Well, creeping about, spying on people.'

Henry was appalled. She had defined his own trade to a nicety. There
might be detectives whose work was above this reproach, but he was a
confirmed creeper, and he knew it. It wasn't his fault. The boss told
him to creep, and he crept. If he declined to creep, he would be sacked
_instanter_. It was hard, and yet he felt the sting of her words,
and in his bosom the first seeds of dissatisfaction with his occupation
took root.

You might have thought that this frankness on the girl's part would
have kept Henry from falling in love with her. Certainly the dignified
thing would have been to change his seat at table, and take his meals
next to someone who appreciated the romance of detective work a little
more. But no, he remained where he was, and presently Cupid, who never
shoots with a surer aim than through the steam of boarding-house hash,
sniped him where he sat.

He proposed to Alice Weston. She refused him.

'It's not because I'm not fond of you. I think you're the nicest man I
ever met.' A good deal of assiduous attention had enabled Henry to win
this place in her af