“There’s a very good answer to the charge you bring against me,” said Erb, trying to keep his temper, “but there’s no earthly reason why I should give it. I’m not responsible to you; I _am_ responsible to my society.” “Ah,” cried Mr. Doubleday, putting his hat on jauntily, “glad you recognise that.” “I _do_ recognise it.” “And having recognised it, you see that it would be very much to your interest that the unfortunate transaction should be kept dark.” “Not at all!” “In which case,” here he stood up ready to go, and slapped his foot with his bamboo cane, “in which case you’d better come, my lad, to this place”—he placed a worn and travelled card with two addresses ruled out and a third written in, “before six o’clock to-night. Before six o’clock, mind. A minute past will be too late. And—er—bring that five-pound note along with you.” He walked jauntily up the aisle of the dining rooms to the street door; when the waitress flew after him, he whispered a few words and pointed back at Erb with his cane. “Is that right?” demanded the waitress breathlessly of Erb, “is that right that you pay?” “Looks like it!” replied Erb moodily. The threat did good in one way in that it aroused all his fighting instincts and that it diverted his mind from Worthing. Going down Walworth Road to look at Rosalind’s house, he rehearsed the expected scene, striking the palm of one hand with the fist the other, and scoring with great neatness over Spanswick and other opponents. Women at the stalls stopped in their loud declaration of the admirable character of their goods, to watch the excited young man as he went by, and remarked to each other that he was evidently in love; an excuse that in their eyes justified any and every sign of eccentric behaviour. On the way back (after walking up and down near the garden of monumental statuary and glancing shyly each time at her window), he met the Professor, and for the sheer pleasure of talking of her engaged him in conversation. The Professor deplored the fact that after you had given the best years of your life to the education of an only child, she should go off to the seaside for a holiday without so much as thinking for a moment of taking you with her, and asked Erb whether he had half a crown about him in exchange for two separate shillings and a sixpence. On Erb producing this coin the Professor found, with many expressions of deep regret, that he had left the smaller pieces in a waistcoat at home. “But I shan’t forget, my dear chap,” said the Professor, raising his hand for a stage clasp. “I am one of those who never permit a kindness to escape from their memory. But I hate to be badgered. That ungrateful young scamp Railton, for instance.” “Ah!” “What have I not done, or rather what have I not promised to do, for him.” “Daresay! But—” “Engaged at one time to my accomplished daughter.” “But what about him?”