Fogies' Club."

He was a stupid fellow, and I had to guide him with my umbrella.

The streets were not quite as they had been in the morning. For
instance, the bookshop at the corner was now selling fish. I dropped
David a hint of what was going on.

"It doesn't make me littler, does it?" he asked anxiously; and then,
with a terrible misgiving: "It won't make me too little, will it,
father?" by which he meant that he hoped it would not do for him
altogether. He slipped his hand nervously into mine, and I put it in my
pocket.

You can't think how little David looked as we entered the portals of the
club.

II. The Little Nursery Governess

As I enter the club smoking-room you are to conceive David vanishing
into nothingness, and that it is any day six years ago at two in the
afternoon. I ring for coffee, cigarette, and cherry brandy, and take my
chair by the window, just as the absurd little nursery governess comes
tripping into the street. I always feel that I have rung for her.

While I am lifting the coffee-pot cautiously lest the lid fall into the
cup, she is crossing to the post-office; as I select the one suitable
lump of sugar she is taking six last looks at the letter; with the aid
of William I light my cigarette, and now she is re-reading the delicious
address. I lie back in my chair, and by this time she has dropped the
letter down the slit. I toy with my liqueur, and she is listening to
hear whether the postal authorities have come for her letter. I scowl at
a fellow-member who has had the impudence to enter the smoking-room, and
her two little charges are pulling her away from the post-office. When
I look out at the window again she is gone, but I shall ring for her
to-morrow at two sharp.

She must have passed the window many times before I noticed her. I know
not where she lives, though I suppose it to be hard by. She is taking
the little boy and girl, who bully her, to the St. James's Park, as
their hoops tell me, and she ought to look crushed and faded. No doubt
her mistress overworks her. It must enrage the other servants to see her
deporting herself as if she were quite the lady.

I noticed that she had sometimes other letters to post, but that
the posting of the one only was a process. They shot down the slit,
plebeians all, but it followed pompously like royalty. I have even seen
her blow a kiss after it.

Then there was her ring, of which she was as conscious as if it rather
than s