himself that she was not mad, and acknowledged also that the less said about that seventy pounds the better.  From thence he crossed Piccadilly, and sauntered down St. James’s Street into Pall Mall, revolving in his mind how he would carry himself with Clavvy.  He, at any rate, had his ground for triumph.  He had parted with no money, and had ascertained by his own wit that no available assistance from that quarter was to be had in the matter which his friend had in hand.

It was some hours after this when the two friends met, and at that time Doodles was up to his eyes in chalk and the profitable delights of pool.  But Archie was too intent on his business to pay much regard to his friend’s proper avocation.  “Well, Doodles,” he said, hardly waiting till his ambassador had finished his stroke and laid his ball close waxed to one of the cushions.  “Well; have you seen her?”

“Oh, yes; I’ve seen her,” said Doodles, seating himself on an exalted bench which ran round the room, while Archie, with anxious eyes, stood before him.

“Well?” said Archie.

“She’s a rum ’un.  Thank ’ee, Griggs; you always stand to me like a brick.”  This was said to a young lieutenant who had failed to hit the captain’s ball, and now tendered him a shilling with a very bitter look.

“She is queer,” said Archie, “certainly.”

“Queer!  By George, I’ll back her for the queerest bit of horseflesh going any way about these diggings.  I thought she was mad at first, but I believe she knows what she’s about.”

“She knows what she’s about well enough..  She’s worth all the money if you can only get her to work.”

“Bosh, my dear fellow.”

“Why bosh?  What’s up now?”

“Bosh!  Bosh!  Bosh!  Me to play, is it?” Down he went, and not finding a good open for a hazard, again waxed himself to the cushion, to the infinite disgust of Griggs, who did indeed hit the ball this time, but in such a way as to make the loss of another life from Griggs’s original three a matter of certainty.  “I don’t think it’s hardly fair,” whispered Griggs to a friend, “a man playing always for safety.  It’s not the game I like, and I shan’t play at the same table with Doodles any more.”

“It’s all bosh,” repeated Doodles, coming back to his seat.  “She don’t mean to do anything, and never did.  I’ve found her out.”

“Found out what?”

“She’s been laughing at you.  She got your money out from under your glove, didn’t she?”

“Well, I did put it there.”

“Of course, you did.  I knew that I should find out what was what if I once went there.  I got it all out of her.  But, by George, what a woman she is!  She swore at me to my very face.”

“Swore at you!  In French, you mean?”

“No; not in French at all, but damned me in downright English.  By George, how I did laugh!—­me and everybody belonging to me.  I’m blessed if she didn’t.”