door, and from the
threshold said:

"Yes: you'd better send him away--if you can."

As Pollyooly went to let the visitor in, she heard him (Mr. Vance) turn
his key in the lock of his bedroom door.

It was perhaps as well that he did so; for as Pollyooly opened the
front door a young man whose flashing eye proclaimed him Mr. Reginald
Butterwick, pushed quickly past her and bounced into the studio.

Pollyooly followed him quickly, somewhat surprised by his size. He
bounced well into the studio with an air of splendid intrepidity, which
would have been more splendid had he been three or four inches higher
and thicker, and uttered a snort of disappointment at its emptiness.

He turned on Pollyooly and snapped out:

"Where's your guv'ner? Where's Hilary Vance?" Pollyooly hesitated; she
was still taken aback by the young man's lack of the formidable
largeness Flossie had led her to expect; and she was, besides, a very
truthful child. Then she said:

"I expect he's somewhere in Chelsea."

"When'll he be back?" snapped the young man.

"He's generally in to tea," with less hesitation; and she looked at him
with very limpid eyes.

"He is, is he? Then I'll wait for him," said the young man in as
bloodcurdling a tone as his size would allow: he did not stand five
feet three in his boots.

He stood still for a moment, scowling round the studio; then he said in
a dreadful tone:

"There'll be plenty of room for us."

He fell into the position of a prizefighter on guard and danced two
steps to the right, and two steps to the left.

Pollyooly gazed at him earnestly. Except for his flashing eye, he was
not a figure to dread, for what he lost in height he gained in
slenderness. He was indeed uncommonly slender. In fact, either he had
forgotten to tell Flossie that he was a featherweight boxer, or she had
forgotten to pass the information on. The most terrible thing about
him was his fierce air, and the most dangerous-looking his sharp,
tip-tilted nose.

Then Pollyooly sat down in considerable relief; she was quite sure now
that did Mr. Reginald Butterwick discover that his rival was in his
bedroom and hale him forth, the person who would suffer would be Mr.
Reginald Butterwick. She took up again the gigantic sock she was
mending; and she kept looking up from it to observe with an easy eye
the pride of the Polytechnic as he walked round the studio examining
the draperies, the pictures, and the drawings on the