on
his shoulder-pins, sucking at a pipe and brooding.

"Give me a whisky-and-soda," said I. "If ever a man has earned it!"

"I somehow knew you'd turn up," said Jimmy, mixing. "Not a scratch?
Tell us."

So I told. I didn't tell all, of course. I left out all the
business in the lobby, what the steward had said, what Farrell had
said, and my traffic with the reporters. I humped myself on my
display of oratory.

I must have thrown this--necessarily thrown it--somewhat out of
proportion.

Jimmy said, "Rats! I know all about Caesar's funeral, and you
couldn't do it. You can't come it over us with your spellbound
audience. What you've done is you've kept the bridge ever since the
proud Professor and I started back, and, when they cut it behind you,
you swam the river."

"Have it which way you like," said I, dropping into a chair.
"Now tell me how you two have been getting along."

"Our motto," said Jimmy, "has been Plain Living and High Thinking.
We have fleeted the time in earnest discourse. It began on the way
home with the Professor asking me some innocent question concerning
what he called the 'Science' of Ju-Jitsu. I told him that it was of
Japanese origin, as its name implied, and further that he did wrong
to call it a Science; it was really an Art. I engaged that I could
prove this to him in thirty seconds, but said I would wait until we
reached home, lest he might be trying his discovery on the Police.
This led to a discussion on the Art of Self-Defence, in the course of
which he let fall the incredible remark that he had never been inside
the National Sporting Club."

"Give him time," said I. "Jack's a methodical worker, as every man
of science should be. He'll come to it; but, so far, his researches
have been confined to the lower animals."

Jimmy looked puzzled. "Eh? . . . Oh, you mean politicians. Well, it
occurred to me that if he meant to attend any more political
meetings, there was no time to be lost. So--"

"But I don't," Jack growled.

Jimmy corrected himself. "Perhaps we'd better say, then, that I
thought it well he should know the difference between some public
gatherings and others. So we've been talking about the N.S.C. and
the Professor is under promise to visit it with me, one night, and
see how an argument ought to be conducted."

I lit a pipe and looked at Foe over the match. "Jack," said I, "a
holiday for you is indicated. With Jimmy's leave I'm going to speak