bout all over the place, this
sort of thing was bound to happen sooner or later. He urged that it
was putting temptation in people's way, and that Mr. Brewster had only
himself to blame. Whatever the rights of the case, the Buffet Froid
undoubtedly came in remarkably handy at this crisis in the Sausage
Chappie's life. He had almost reached the sideboard when the stout man
patted the girl's cheek, and to seize a huckleberry pie was with him the
work of a moment. The next instant the pie had whizzed past the other's
head and burst like a shell against the wall.

There are, no doubt, restaurants where this sort of thing would
have excited little comment, but the Cosmopolis was not one of them.
Everybody had something to say, but the only one among those present who
had anything sensible to say was the child in the sailor suit.

"Do it again!" said the child, cordially.

The Sausage Chappie did it again. He took up a fruit salad, poised it
for a moment, then decanted it over Mr. Gossett's bald head. The child's
happy laughter rang over the restaurant. Whatever anybody else might
think of the affair, this child liked it and was prepared to go on
record to that effect.

Epic events have a stunning quality. They paralyse the faculties. For
a moment there was a pause. The world stood still. Mr. Brewster bubbled
inarticulately. Mr. Gossett dried himself sketchily with a napkin. The
Sausage Chappie snorted.

The girl had risen to her feet and was staring wildly.

"John!" she cried.

Even at this moment of crisis the Sausage Chappie was able to look
relieved.

"So it is!" he said. "And I thought it was Lancelot!"

"I thought you were dead!"

"I'm not!" said the Sausage Chappie.

Mr. Gossett, speaking thickly through the fruit-salad, was understood
to say that he regretted this. And then confusion broke loose again.
Everybody began to talk at once.

"I say!" said Archie. "I say! One moment!"

Of the first stages of this interesting episode Archie had been a
paralysed spectator. The thing had numbed him. And then--

Sudden a thought came, like a full-blown rose.
Flushing his brow.

When he reached the gesticulating group, he was calm and business-like.
He had a constructive policy to suggest.

"I say," he said. "I've got an idea!"

"Go away!" said Mr. Brewster. "This is bad enough without you butting
in."

Archie quelled him with a gesture.

"Leave us," he said. "We would be alone. I want to have