brass bar and shot up a kind of
a drain. This gallery was a large and brilliant room, with the
front-wall taken out. It was hung with mirrors and cretonnes, it was
richly carpeted, and, of course, it was lighted by electricity. Carved
and gilded tables bore a whole armoury of weapons. You shot at
tobacco-pipes, twisting and stationary, at balls poised on jets of
water, and at proper targets. In the corners of the saloon, near the
open, were large crimson plush lounges, on which you lounged after the
fatigue of shooting.

A pink-clad girl, young and radiant, had the concern in charge.

She was speeding a party of bankrupt shooters, when she caught sight of
Ellis. Ellis answered her smile, and strolled up to the booth with a
countenance that might have meant anything. You can never tell what a
dog is thinking.

''Ello!' said the girl prettily (or, rather, she shouted prettily,
having to compete with the two orchestras). 'You here again?'

The truth was that Ellis had been there on the previous night, when the
Wakes was only half opened, and he had come again to-night expressly in
order to see her; but he would not have admitted, even to himself, that
he had come expressly in order to see her; in his mind it was just a
chance that he might see her. She was a jolly girl. (We are gradually
approaching the scandalous part.)

'What a jolly frock!' he said, when he had shot five celluloid balls in
succession off a jet of water.

Smiling, she mechanically took a ball out of the basket and let it roll
down the conduit to the fountain.

'Do you think so?' she replied, smoothing the fluffy muslin apron with
her small hands, black from contact with the guns. 'That one I wore last
night was my second-best. I only wear this on Saturdays and Mondays.'

He nodded like a connoisseur. The sixth ball had sprung up to the top of
the jet. He removed it with the certainty of a King's Prize winner, and
she complimented him.

'Ah!' he said, 'you should have seen me before I took to smoking and
drinking!'

She laughed freely. She was always showing her fine teeth. And she had
such a frank, jolly countenance, not exactly pretty--better than pretty.
She was a little short and a little plump, and she wore a necklace round
her neck, a ring on her dainty, dirty finger, and a watch-bracelet on
her wrist.

'Why!' she exclaimed. 'How old are you?'

'How old are _you_?' he retorted.

Dogs do not give things away like that.

'I'm ninet