Then Pollyooly sat down in considerable relief; she was quite sure now that did Mr. Reginald Butterwick discover that his rival was in his bedroom and hale him forth, the person who would suffer would be Mr. Reginald Butterwick. She took up again the gigantic sock she was mending; and she kept looking up from it to observe with an easy eye the pride of the Polytechnic as he walked round the studio examining the draperies, the pictures, and the drawings on the wall. Whenever his eye rested on one signed by Hilary Vance he sniffed a bitter, contemptuous sniff. For these he had but three words of criticism; they were: "Rot!" "Rubbish!" and "Piffle!" Once he said in a bitterly scoffing tone: "I suppose your precious guv'ner thinks he's got the artistic temperament." "I don't know," said Pollyooly. He squared briskly up to an easel, danced lightly on his toes before it, and said: "I'll give him the artistic temperament all right." At last he paused in his wanderings before the industrious Pollyooly, and his eyes fell on the gigantic sock she was darning. She saw his expression change; something of the fierce confidence of the intrepid boxer passed out of his face. "I say, what's that you're darning?" he said quickly. "It's a sock," said Pollyooly. "It looks more like a sack than a sock. Whose sock is it?" said Mr. Reginald Butterwick; and there was a faint note of anxiety in his tone. "It's Mr. Vance's sock," said Pollyooly; and with gentle pride she held it up in a fashion to display its full proportions. Mr. Reginald Butterwick took two or three nervous steps to the right, looking askance at the sock as he moved. It was not really as large as a sack. "Big man, your guv'ner? Eh?" he said in a finely careless tone. "I should think he was!" cried Pollyooly with enthusiasm. Mr. Reginald Butterwick looked still more earnestly at the sock and said: "One of those tall lanky chaps--eh?" "He's tall, but he isn't lanky--not a bit," said Pollyooly quickly. "He's tremendously big--broad and thick as well as tall, you know. He's more like a giant than a man." "Oh, I know those giants--flabby--flabby," said Mr. Reginald Butterwick; and he laughed a short, scoffing laugh which rang uneasy. "He's not flabby!" cried Pollyooly indignantly. "He's tremendously strong. Why--why--when he heard you were coming he smashed that chair and kicked it into the corner just because he was annoyed." Mr. Reginald Butterwick looked at the smallish fragments of the chair in the corner; and his face became the face of a quiet, respectable clerk. "He did, did he?" he said coldly. "Yes, and he wanted to tear you limb from limb. He said so," said Pollyooly. "That's a game two can play at," said Mr. Reginald Butterwick; but his tone lacked conviction. "Oh, he'd do it--quite easily," said Pollyooly confidently.