nything up there?"

"Uh-huh," says I. "His name was Stukey. Another case of drawin' his pay
from Berlin."

"Hah!" grunts Old Hickory, bitin' into his cigar. "The long arm again.
But can't you recommend something?"

"Sure!" says I. "If we could find a pair of gold boots about eighteen
buttons high, we ought to send 'em to Anna Sobowski."

CHAPTER XI

AT THE TURN WITH WILFRED

I expect Mr. Robert overstated the case a bit. He was more or less
hectic back of the ears about then, havin' just broken away after a
half-hour session with Mrs. Stanton Bliss.

"That woman," says he, slumpin' into a chair and moppin' his brow, "has
the mental equipment of a pet rabbit and the disposition of a setting
hen. Good Lord!"

I looks over at Vee and grins. Had to. It ain't often you see Mr. Robert
like that. And him bein' all dolled up in his nifty navy uniform made it
seem just that much funnier. But Vee don't grin back. She'd sympathize
with 'most anybody. At that exact minute, I'll bet she was bein' sorry
for both of 'em all in the same breath, as you might say.

"But can't something be done--somehow?" she asks.

"Not by me," says Mr. Robert, decided. "Great marlinspikes! I'm not the
war department, am I? I'm only a first-grade lieutenant in command of a
blessed, smelly old menhaden trawler that's posing as a mine-sweeper. I
am supposed to be enjoying a twenty-four hour shore leave in the peace
and quiet of my home, and I get--this."

He waves his hand toward the other room, where the afore-mentioned Mrs.
Stanton Bliss is sobbin, sniffin', and otherwise registerin' deep
emotion by clawin' Mrs. Robert about the shoulders and wavin' away the
smellin' salts.

"If it was the first time," growls Mr. Robert. "But it isn't."

That was true, too. You see, we'd heard somethin' about the other
spasms. They'd begun along in July, when the awful news came out that
Wilfred's red ink number had been plucked from the jar. Now you get it,
don't you? Nothing unique. The same little old tragedy that was bein'
staged in a million homes, includin' four-room flats, double-decker
tenements, and boardin'-houses.

Only this happened to hit the forty-room country house of the Stanton
Blisses. Course, it was different. Look who was bein' stirred up by it.

So mother had begun throwin' cat-fits. She'd tackled everyone she knew,
demandin' to know what was to be done to keep Wilfred out of it. Among
others, of course, she'd held up Mr. R