OUR MR. MONTAGU _(practising on dummy)._ "THE LATEST LINE IN WESTERN HEAD-WEAR, SIR, AND, IF YOU WILL ALLOW ME TO SAY SO, VERY BECOMING TO YOU. THANK YOU, SIR, AND THE NEXT ARTICLE?"] * * * * * [Illustration: _Son of the House (after being introduced to professor of mathematics)._ "NOW WHAT SHALL I TALK TO YOU ABOUT?"] * * * * * A TANGLED TRIANGLE. The Pâtisserie Delarue et Salon de Consommations is situated just on the edge of Europe. Being a place of extreme military importance I dare not indicate its position with greater exactitude, but may go so far as to say that it can be found by stepping off the boat, crossing the bridge and then inquiring of the Military Police. Its importance is due to the quality of its _crème éclairs_, which attract the gilded Staff in such large numbers that the interior is usually suffused like an Eastern sunset with a rich glow of red tabs and gilt braid. Within its walls junior subalterns, now, alas, a rapidly diminishing species, dally with insidious ices until their immature moustaches are pendulous with lemon-flavoured icicles and their hair is whitened with sugared rime. There it was that Frederick discovered Percival feebly and mournfully pecking at a vanilla ice. "Greeting, old Spartan," said he. "Training for the Murman coast?" "Would that I were!" replied Percival. "I'm refrigerating my sorrows. I've tried to drown them, but they float; so I'm by way of freezing them under." "Poor Perce!" murmured Frederick. "I suppose it's Cox again?" "_Au contraire_, I'm _his_ sorrow. My present trouble is that I've got to find a wife." "Nothin' easier, old thing. Your photo in the illustrated papers, with appropriate letterpress--" "You misunderstand me," interrupted Percival. "It's someone else's wife I've got to find. _Écoutez_. Teddy Roker has got permission for his wife to visit him out here. He's expecting her by this afternoon's boat and has got a billet fixed up all right, but he's been suddenly rushed away on a court-martial case, so he's asked me to meet her, and I've never seen her before." "But didn't he give you the specifications--kind of descriptive return?" "That's just it!" groaned Percival. "He was only married last leave, and his description goes like a Shakspearean sonnet. I gather that I've got to look out for a combination of _Titania_, GLADYS COOPER and HELEN OF TROY. I tried to nail him down to externals, but he only went off into another rhapsody. "'What does she wear?' I asked. "'Wear?' said he dreamily. 'Oh! beautifully draped garments nebulous as summer clouds and filmy as gossamer webs. Nothing really definite.' "'That sounds probable enough, as the present fashions go,'" said I. "Seems to me," said Frederick, "that this is a case to refer to higher authority. The sleuth-hound instinct of one Frederick is indicated. Having absorbed the available data I will e'en amble round myself to assist you."