"Don't you mention my wife, Augustus, or you and I and that malacca will have a period of great activity. I was saying that _I_ am disappointed in you, Augustus, and truly grieved to find you so shallow and false. I asked you to take me on the river to-night and you lied to me and took a very different type of--er--person. Such meanness and ingratitude fairly get me, Augustus. Now I never _asked_ you to run after me and come and swear I had saved your dirty little soul alive, but since you did it, Augustus, and _I_ have come to take a deep interest in saving the thing--why, you've got to stick it, Augustus--and if you don't--why, then I'll make you, my dear." "Dearman, your wife has been the noblest friend----" "_Will_ you come off it, Augustus? I don't want to be cruel. Now look here. _I_ have got accustomed to having you about the house and employing you in those funny little ways in which you are a useful little animal. I am under no delusion as to the value of that Soul of yours--but, such as it is, _I_ am determined to save it. So just you bring it round to tea to-morrow, as usual; and don't you ever be absent again without my permission. You began the game and I'll end it--when I think fit. Grand malacca that." "Dearman, I will always----" "'Course you will. See you at tea to-morrow, Gussie. If ever my wife hears of this I'll kill you painfully. Bye-Bye." Augustus was present at tea next day, and, thenceforth, so regular was he that Mrs. Dearman found, first, that she had been very foolish in thinking that her Brand was slipping back into the fire and, later, that Gussie was a bore and a nuisance. One day he said in the presence of John:-- "I can't keep that golf engagement on Saturday, dear lady, I have to attend a meeting of the Professors, Principal and College Board". "Have you seen my malacca cane, Pat," said Dearman. "I want it." "But I really have!" said Augustus, springing up. "Of course you have," replied Dearman. "What _do_ you mean?" * * * * * "John dear," remarked Mrs. Dearman one day, "I wish you could give Gussie a hint not to come quite so often. I have given him some very broad ones during the last few months, but he won't take them. He would from you, I expect." "Tired of the little bounder, Pat?" "Oh, sick and tired. He bores me to tears. I wish he were in Government Service and could be transferred. A Government man's always transferred as soon as he has settled to his job. I can't forbid him the house, very well, but I _wish_ he'd realize how weary I am of his poses and new socks." * * * * * Augustus Clarence Percy Marmaduke Grobble sat in the long cane chair in his sitting-room, a look of rebellious discontent upon his face. What could he do? Better chuck his job and clear out! The strain was getting awful. What a relentless, watchful brute Dearman was! To him entered that gentleman after gently tapping at the chamber door.