, don't you know." The
eyes of the multitude made him feel a little nervous "Er--glad to meet
you and all that sort of rot."

"Ten dollars deposit, please," said Willie.

"I don't absolutely follow you, old bean. What is the big thought at the
back of all this?"

"Ten dollars deposit on the chair."

"What chair?"

"You bid forty-five dollars for the chair."

"Me?"

"You nodded," said Willie, accusingly. "If," he went on, reasoning
closely, "you didn't want to bid, why did you nod?"

Archie was embarrassed. He could, of course, have pointed out that he
had merely nodded in adhesion to the statement that the other had a face
like Jo-Jo the dog-faced boy; but something seemed to tell him that
a purist might consider the excuse deficient in tact. He hesitated
a moment, then handed over a ten-dollar bill, the price of Willie's
feelings. Willie withdrew like a tiger slinking from the body of its
victim.

"I say, old thing," said Archie to Reggie, "this is a bit thick, you
know. No purse will stand this drain."

Reggie considered the matter. His face seemed drawn under the mental
strain.

"Don't nod again," he advised. "If you aren't careful, you get into
the habit of it. When you want to bid, just twiddle your fingers. Yes,
that's the thing. Twiddle!"

He sighed drowsily. The atmosphere of the auction room was close; you
weren't allowed to smoke; and altogether he was beginning to regret that
he had come. The service continued. Objects of varying unattractiveness
came and went, eulogised by the officiating priest, but coldly received
by the congregation. Relations between the former and the latter were
growing more and more distant. The congregation seemed to suspect the
priest of having an ulterior motive in his eulogies, and the priest
seemed to suspect the congregation of a frivolous desire to waste his
time. He had begun to speculate openly as to why they were there at all.
Once, when a particularly repellent statuette of a nude female with an
unwholesome green skin had been offered at two dollars and had found no
bidders--the congregation appearing silently grateful for his statement
that it was the only specimen of its kind on the continent--he had
specifically accused them of having come into the auction room merely
with the purpose of sitting down and taking the weight off their feet.

"If your thing--your whatever-it-is, doesn't come up soon, Archie," said
Reggie, fighting off with an effort the mis