which Miss Luker replied, “Ah! that’s because you’re a railway man.” Presently, in one of those sudden blanks of general talk that surprise the unwary, his raised voice was heard to say,— “—Consequence is that the few revel in luxury, while the many—” He hesitated, and went on floundering through the silence. “Whilst the many ’ave not the wherewithal to buy their daily bread.” The awkward silence continued, broken only by the music from the pianoforte and the swishing of skirts. “Erb,” said his sister Alice, frowning over Mr. Danks’s shoulder, “remember where you are.” “Exercise tack, my dear sir,” recommended the butler. “Exercise tack.” “Even visitors,” remarked the housekeeper severely, so that the young woman at the pianoforte should hear, “even visitors ought to draw the line somewhere. We can’t help our opinions, but we can all stop ourselves from expressing them.” The music stopped, and the household looked rather nervously towards the chair, with an endeavour to ascertain whether the occupant had overheard the discordant remarks. To their relief, she leaned engagingly back, and beckoned to Louisa. Louisa, her head twitching with pride and agitation, went across the floor, and stood swinging her programme round and round. “You _can_ play!” admitted Louisa. “Where did you pick it up?” “I want you to bring your brother over to me,” said Lady Frances. Quite useless for the kitchen to pretend that it was giving its entire mind to the subject of refreshments. The situation demanded their eyes and ears; they ate oblong pieces of cake in a detached way, rather as though they were feeding someone else; the housekeeper looked at Alice, and shook her head desolately. “I have been reading about you,” said Lady Frances in her alert, interested way. “Licker to me how these things get into the papers,” he mumbled. “I should be tremendously interested in life,” said the girl, “if I occupied your position. There’s something sporting about it.” She looked at him intently, and he rubbed his nose under a vague impression that it bore some defect. “I wish you the best of good luck.” “Then I shall have it,” said Erb. Alice looked round the room triumphantly, as who should say, _Now_ we are scoring. “Not acquainted much with the working-classes, p’raps, me lady?” “To my regret, no!” “They’re made up of all sorts,” went on Erb, wishing that he dared to look at her white shoulders as she looked at his face, “and for the most part they are very easily led. It’s only now and again that you find one step out of the common ruck.” He hesitated, seeing no way out of the sentence except by a self-congratulatory exit. “If I should ever want to see through Bermondsey,” she said, clasping her knee, her head up attractively, “will you be my guide?” “It would be a proud moment,” said Erb. He added, hastily, “For me, I mean.” “Cook, shall I play one more, and then go back upstairs and leave off bothering you?”