across anything that was at all conventional.  I was reading the book for review, and my notice of it was to appear in The Scalpel on the following Saturday.  It was, on the whole, a capital novel, but it was by an author who had been, I thought, more successful than was good for him.  He had been elected freely to the best Clubs.  During the season he had gone everywhere.  Many editions of his book had been sold.  He had acquired a little cult who said extravagant things about him in the literary papers.  It is sickening to see a man reverenced during his lifetime.  I could imagine him posing before his cult and being pleased; even before I had read a page of his novel, I had made up my mind to administer to him a wholesome corrective in the pages of The Scalpel.  I was rather sorry to find that it was really a capital novel; but it had enough faults for my purpose.

I had read for some time before I turned my attention to the game again.  When I did so, I was startled, for it was perfectly obvious that BILL was giving the game away.  His usual service is a little like invisible lightning with a bend in it; he was now serving in a modified manner, which he generally uses only when he is playing with girls who are not his sisters.  It was also obvious that TOMMY, who looked very elated, fully believed that he was winning on his own merits, and had no idea that BILL was merely allowing him to win.

[Illustration]

“My game—­and set!” cried TOMMY, joyously.

“You’ve improved awfully,” said BILL.

I could not imagine why BILL had intentionally lost that set, for I knew that he hated losing.  When TOMMY had gone home again to the Rectory, BILL came up to me to ask how old I thought a man ought to be before he began smoking.  I said that I thought thirty-six was about the right age, and asked BILL why he had let TOMMY win.

“Oh, nothing particular,” said BILL, in his matter-of-fact way; “only I’d never seen him wear that kind of tie before, and I asked him what he was doing it for, and he said it was for his aunt; she died a few weeks back; so I thought I might as well give him the set to make up for it.”

I was rather amused.  “TOMMY looked very pleased with himself,” I said.

“Yes, he’ll brag about that game all over the place,” replied BILL, rather despondently.  For a moment or two he was silent, imagining the triumph and pride of TOMMY.  “I’d punch his head as soon as look at him,” he added.

“What on earth for?  He thought he’d won by play.”

“He can’t play any more than a cow, but that’s not it.  I hate to see anyone get so glorious about anything.  Well, I don’t know—­it’s kind of natural.  He’d have had a right to brag, if he had really won, and he thought he did.”

“Anyhow,” I said, severely, “it’s a mean trick to want to damage anyone, just because he’s pleased with himself when he’s got a right to be.”