“What a little marvel he is!” said Lucille, regarding her husband affectionately.  “He eats a lot of fish, Bill.  That’s what makes him so clever!”

“Shrimps!” diagnosed Bill, churlishly.

“Do you know the leader of the orchestra in the restaurant downstairs?” asked Archie, ignoring the slur.

“I know there is a leader of the orchestra.  What about him?”

“A sound fellow.  Great pal of mine.  I’ve forgotten his name—­”

“Call him Pootles!” suggested Lucille.

“Desist!” said Archie, as a wordless growl proceeded from his stricken brother-in-law.  “Temper your hilarity with a modicum of reserve.  This girlish frivolity is unseemly.  Well, I’m going to have a chat with this chappie and fix it all up.”

“Fix what up?”

“The whole jolly business.  I’m going to kill two birds with one stone.  I’ve a composer chappie popping about in the background whose one ambish. is to have his pet song sung before a discriminating audience.  You have a singer straining at the leash.  I’m going to arrange with this egg who leads the orchestra that your female shall sing my chappie’s song downstairs one night during dinner.  How about it?  Is it or is it not a ball of fire?”

“It’s not a bad idea,” admitted Bill, brightening visibly.  “I wouldn’t have thought you had it in you.”

“Why not?”

“Well—­”

“It’s a capital idea,” said Lucille.  “Quite out of the question, of course.”

“How do you mean?”

“Don’t you know that the one thing Father hates more than anything else in the world is anything like a cabaret?  People are always coming to him, suggesting that it would brighten up the dinner hour if he had singers and things, and he crushes them into little bits.  He thinks there’s nothing that lowers the tone of a place more.  He’ll bite you in three places when you suggest it to him!”

“Ah!  But has it escaped your notice, lighting system of my soul, that the dear old dad is not at present in residence?  He went off to fish at Lake What’s-its-name this morning.”

“You aren’t dreaming of doing this without asking him?”

“That was the general idea.”

“But he’ll be furious when he finds out.”

“But will he find out?  I ask you, will he?”

“Of course he will.”

“I don’t see why he should,” said Bill, on whose plastic mind the plan had made a deep impression.

“He won’t,” said Archie, confidently.  “This wheeze is for one night only.  By the time the jolly old guv’nor returns, bitten to the bone by mosquitoes, with one small stuffed trout in his suit-case, everything will be over and all quiet once more along the Potomac.  The scheme is this.  My chappie wants his song heard by a publisher.  Your girl wants her voice heard by one of the blighters who get up concerts and all that sort of thing.  No doubt you know such a bird, whom you could invite to the hotel for a bit of dinner?”