g sounded at the door, and she went out into the corridor to follow
Helen Ross to the Gym.

The auction had already begun, and the auctioneer, a fresh-looking girl
with grey eyes planted extraordinarily far apart, was engaged in
extolling the excellencies of an aged kettle to a laughing circle of
girls. She wore a black dress cut square at the neck, and a rose-
coloured ribbon twined round her head. She held out the kettle at the
length of a bare white arm, and raised her clear voice in delightful
imitation of the professional wheedle.

"Friends and Freshers! We now come to Lot Three, one of the most
striking and interesting on the catalogue. A kettle, ladies, is always
a useful article, but this is no ordinary kettle. We have it on
unimpeachable authority that this kettle was the kettle in residence at
the establishment of our late colleague Miss Constantia Lawson, the
Senior Classic of her year! The kettle of a Senior Classic, Freshers!
The kettle which has ministered to her refreshment, which has been, in
the language of the poem, the fount of her inspiration! What price
shall I say, ladies, for the kettle of a Senior Classic? Sixpence! Did
somebody say sixpence! _For the kettle of a Senior Classic_!
Eightpence! Thank you, madam. For the kettle of a-- What advance on
eightpence? Freshers would do well to consider this opportunity before
it is too late. What an--an _inebriating_ effect, if I may use the word
without offence to the late lamented poet, would be added to the cup
that cheers by the thought that the same handle, the same spout, the
same--er--er--furry deposit in the inside, have ministered to the
refreshment of one of the master spirits of our day! Going at
eightpence--eightpence-halfpenny--I thank you, madam! At tenpence! No
advance on tenpence? Going--going--_gone_!"

The hammer descended with a rap, the auctioneer leaned back with an air
of exhaustion, and handed the kettle to her clerk, in blue silk and
crystal beads.

"Lady to the right. Tell the lady, Joshua, that the small hole in the
bottom can easily be soldered by an obliging ironmonger, or, if she
prefers, she can hang the kettle on the wall as an object of vertu!"

Peals of laughter greeted this tragic disclosure. The lady to the right
refused for some minutes to hand over her tenpence, but finally
succumbed to the feeling of the meeting, when a crumpled cotton bed-
cover was next produced for sale.

"Lot Four. Hands