Get us three firsts to King's Crawss, and 'ave a label ready to smudge
on the winder, w'ile me an' my girl gets 'im through to the platform,
nice and cushy."

Supported on each side, with flaccid legs just able to move in turn,
Melchard was guided to a bench some way down the platform, and seated
between two bolstering forms to which the contact was disgusting.

Fortunately they had the up-platform to themselves.

The train was late, and the long minutes held each more of anxiety than
the last.

The porter came with the tickets.

"'Eere's 'opeless 'Arry," said Dick, going to meet him.

"Wi't'yoong spark in thot trim," said the porter, pocketing a tip of
weight to gratify without astounding, "Ah'd'a' pushed onto Lunnon wi'
'im in t'car."

"Not if you'd borrered it, Mr. 'Opeless. She belongs to a Mr. Mills o'
Melborough--Na-ow! _Melchard_ o' Millsborough. 'E's one o' them there
painful dentisters."

A sound like a smothered sneeze, followed by a syncopated gurgle, coming
from behind him, warned Dick to tone down the comic relief.

"You get the car run into cover, and keep an eye on 'er till that there
Pluck-'em-W'ile-yer-Wait comes a sorrowing arter 'er. Tell 'im my
address is No. 5, John Street, London, and I'll settle for the bit o'
damage. There's no need to bring 'is young lordship in. There's plenty
o' wailin' an' gnashin' comin' to 'im, any'ow."

In a sad-coloured notebook, with a stump of dirty pencil, the porter
solemnly noted that classic address.

"An' that's more trouble for _you_, so 'ere's a few more bits o' wot we
takes it for."

Four minutes late, the train rumbled in.

With less difficulty than it had taken to extract him from the car, Dick
and the porter got Melchard into the corner of a first-class compartment
of the last carriage on the train--behind the guard's van even, being
the London "slip," the porter told them as he slapped his "engaged"
label on the window.

The guard was on the point of waving his flag when the staccato rush of
a motor-cycle sounded hideously outside the little station.

"Get in," said Dick to Amaryllis.

The guard called to the porter:

"Can't keep 'er. Five minutes behind already," and let his green signal
flutter.

Dick followed Amaryllis and closed the door.

And even as the engine made its first slow movement, there came a rush
of heavy feet on the wooden flooring of the booking-office, and two men
in motor-cycling rig made a determined dash at the