“Yus.  And everyone knew Reggie was the fav’rit.  Smiled all over his fat face, the old serpint did!  And when it come to my turn, ’e says to me, ‘Sorry, Elbert!’ ’e says, ’but there ain’t no more names.  They’ve give out!’ ’Oh, they ’ave, ‘ave they?’ I says, ’Well, wot’s the matter with giving a fellow a sporting chance?’ I says.  ’Ow do you mean?’ ’e says.  ‘Why, write me out a ticket marked “Mr. X.",’ I says.  ’Then, if ’er lidyship marries anyone not in the ’ouse-party, I cop!’ ‘Orl right,’ ’e says, ’but you know the conditions of this ‘ere sweep.  Nothin’ don’t count only wot tikes plice during the two weeks of the ‘ouse-party,’ ’e says.  ‘Orl right,’ I says.  ’Write me ticket.  It’s a fair sportin’ venture.’  So ’e writes me out me ticket, with ‘Mr. X.’ on it, and I says to them all, I says, ’I’d like to ‘ave witnesses’, I says, ’to this ’ere thing.  Do all you gents agree that if anyone not in the ’ouse-party and ’oo’s name ain’t on one of the other tickets marries ’er lidyship, I get the pool?’ I says.  They all says that’s right, and then I says to ’em all straight out, I says, ’I ‘appen to know’, I says, ’that ’er lidyship is in love with a gent that’s not in the party at all.  An American gent,’ I says.  They wouldn’t believe it at first, but, when Keggs ’ad put two and two together, and thought of one or two things that ’ad ’appened, ’e turned as white as a sheet and said it was a swindle and wanted the drawin’ done over again, but the others says ‘No’, they says, ‘it’s quite fair,’ they says, and one of ’em offered me ten bob slap out for my ticket.  But I stuck to it, I did.  And that,” concluded Albert throwing the cigarette into the fire-place just in time to prevent a scorched finger, “that’s why I’m going to ’elp yer!”

There is probably no attitude of mind harder for the average man to maintain than that of aloof disapproval.  George was an average man, and during the degrading recital just concluded he had found himself slipping.  At first he had been revolted, then, in spite of himself, amused, and now, when all the facts were before him, he could induce his mind to think of nothing else than his good fortune in securing as an ally one who appeared to combine a precocious intelligence with a helpful lack of scruple.  War is war, and love is love, and in each the practical man inclines to demand from his fellow-workers the punch rather than a lofty soul.  A page boy replete with the finer feelings would have been useless in this crisis.  Albert, who seemed, on the evidence of a short but sufficient acquaintance, to be a lad who would not recognize the finer feelings if they were handed to him on a plate with watercress round them, promised to be invaluable.  Something in his manner told George that the child was bursting with schemes for his benefit.

“Have some more cake, Albert,” he said ingratiatingly.

The boy shook his head.

“Do,” urged George.  “Just a little slice.”