ouse to the short skirt, reaching little below her
knees.

"If I _was_ your uncle, young woman," he remarked, "I'd slap you into
becomin' decent."

The girl jumped on to a bus that had just drawn up, and with a swirl
of skirt and wealth of limb, waved her hand as she climbed the stairs.

"So long, old dear!" she cried.

"Got enough powder on 'er face to whitewash 'er feet," remarked a
workman to Bindle as he resumed his walk.

"Women is funny things," responded Bindle. "They never seems to be
wearin' so little, but wot they can't leave orf a bit more."

"You're right, mate," replied the man when he had digested the remark.
"If I was the police I'd run 'em in."

"Well," said Bindle philosophically, "there is some wot likes to see
all the goods in the window. S'long!" and he turned off the Fulham
Road, leaving the workman to pursue his journey puzzling over Bindle's
enigmatical utterance.

"'Ullo, Charlie!" greeted Bindle, as he entered the porter's lodge of
Fulham Square Mansions. "'Ere I am, come to take care of all the
little birds in the nest wot you're a-leavin' behind."

Charlie Hart was a big man with a heavy moustache, a brow whereon the
creases of worry had a perpetual abiding-place, and an indeterminate
chin. "Charlie ought to wear a beard," was Bindle's verdict.

"Glad you come, Joe. I'll 'ave time to go over things again. Train
don't go till four."

During the next few hours Bindle was once more taken over the salient
features of the life of a porter at a block of residential flats.
Charlie Hart had no system or order in conveying his instructions, and
Bindle saw that he would have to depend upon his own wits to meet such
crises as arose.

Mrs. Sedge, Mrs. Hart's mother, would look after those tenants who did
not possess servants.

"She's all right when she ain't after 'Royal Richard,'" explained
Charlie Hart.

"An' who's Royal Richard?" enquired Bindle with interest.

"Gin!" was Charlie Hart's laconic response.

Charlie enumerated the numbers of the flats, the occupants of which
were to be "done for." One thing he particularly emphasised, Number
Six was temporarily vacant. The owner was away; but it was let
furnished from the following Monday to a Miss Cissie Boye, who was one
of those to be "done for." Bindle was particularly cautioned to see
that there were no "carryings on," whereat he winked reassuringly.

Mrs. Sedge was a stolid matron, whose outlook on life had reached the
dregs o