e bell.

"Ye're doing it verra weel," remarked approvingly the Wee Laddie. "Ye're
just fitted for it by nature."

"Fitted for what?" demanded the Briefless one, waking up apparently from
a dream.

"For an Adelphi guest at eighteenpence the night," assured him the Wee
Laddie. "Ye're just splendid at it."

The Briefless one, muttering that the worst of mixing with journalists
was that if you did not watch yourself, you fell into their ways, drank
his whisky in silence. Later, the Babe swore on a copy of _Sell's
Advertising Guide_ that, crossing the Park, he had seen the Briefless one
leaning over the railings of Rotten Row, clad in a pair of new kid
gloves, swinging a silver-headed cane.

One morning towards the end of the week, Joseph Loveredge, looking twenty
years younger than when Peter had last seen him, dropped in at the
editorial office of _Good Humour_ and demanded of Peter Hope how he felt
and what he thought of the present price of Emma Mines.

Peter Hope's fear was that the gambling fever was spreading to all
classes of society.

"I want you to dine with us on Sunday," said Joseph Loveredge. "Jack
Herring will be there. You might bring Tommy with you."

Peter Hope gulped down his astonishment and said he should be delighted;
he thought that Tommy also was disengaged. "Mrs. Loveredge out of town,
I presume?" questioned Peter Hope.

"On the contrary," replied Joseph Loveredge, "I want you to meet her."

Joseph Loveredge removed a pile of books from one chair and placed them
carefully upon another, after which he went and stood before the fire.

"Don't if you don't like," said Joseph Loveredge; "but if you don't mind,
you might call yourself, just for the evening--say, the Duke of
Warrington."

"Say the what?" demanded Peter Hope.

"The Duke of Warrington," repeated Joey. "We are rather short of dukes.
Tommy can be the Lady Adelaide, your daughter."

"Don't be an ass!" said Peter Hope.

"I'm not an ass," assured him Joseph Loveredge. "He is wintering in
Egypt. You have run back for a week to attend to business. There is no
Lady Adelaide, so that's quite simple."

"But what in the name of--" began Peter Hope.

"Don't you see what I'm driving at?" persisted Joey. "It was Jack's idea
at the beginning. I was frightened myself at first, but it is working to
perfection. She sees you, and sees that you are a gentleman. When the
truth comes out--as, of course, it must later on--the laugh