d so."

"It would be just like Vittie," said Titherington, "to pretend he had
it so as to get an excuse for calling in McMeekin. He knows McMeekin has
been wobbling ever since you got ill."

This silenced me. If Vittie is crafty enough to devise such a
complicated scheme-for bribing McMeekin without bringing himself within
the meshes of the Corrupt Practices Act he is certainly too wise to
allow himself to be subjected to my nurse.

"Anyway," said Titherington, "it's not Vittie's influenza I came here to
talk about."

"Have you got the key of your bag with you?"

Titherington was in a bad temper, but he allowed himself to grin. He
went down on his hands and knees and dragged the bag from its hiding
place under the bed.

We opened two half bottles, but although Titherington drank a great deal
more than his share he remained morose.

"That girl," he said, "is playing old hookey with the constituency. I
won't be answerable for the consequences unless she's stopped at once."

"I suppose you're speaking about Miss Beresford?"

"Instead of talking rot about woman's suffrage," said Titherington
savagely, "and ragging Vittie, which is what we brought her here for,
she's going round calling everybody a liar. And it won't do. I tell you
it won't do at all."

"You said it was a good speech," I reminded him.

"I shouldn't have minded that speech. It's what she's been at since
then. She spent all day yesterday and the whole of this morning going
round from house to house gassing about the way nobody in political life
ever speaks the truth. She has a lot of young fools worked up to such a
state that I can scarcely show my face in the streets, and I hear that
they mobbed a man up at the railway station who came down to support
O'Donoghue. He deserved it, of course, but it's impossible to say who
they'll attack next. Half the town is going about with yards of white
ribbon pinned on to them."

"What on earth for?"

"Some foolery. It's the badge of some blasted society she's started.
There's A.S.P.L. on the ribbons."

"I told you at the start," I said, "that the letters A.S.P.L. couldn't
stand for votes for women, but you would have it that they did."

"She has the whole town placarded with notices of a meeting she's going
to hold to-morrow night. We can't possibly have that, you know."

"Well, why don't you stop her?"

"Stop her! I've done every damned thing I could to stop her. I went
round to her this morning and