WHEN Skippy Bedelle (rage and disillusionment in his heart) had tramped five weary miles back from the city which sheltered that angel of perfidy, Miss Mimi Lafontaine, he said to himself on waking the next morning: "Well, by the Great Horned Spoon, that's one thing I won't bite at again." And examining himself in the glass with a new respect--for after all he had handled the situation with magnificent impertinence and if the story was to be retailed in the home circles it would never be introduced by Miss Clara Bedelle--examining himself, then, with a certain pride and satisfaction he said vaingloriously, "Hurray, I'm vaccinated!" "How d'ye mean vaccinated?" said Snorky whose head emerged via the morning jersey. "Did I say vaccinated?" said Skippy surprised and cautious. "You certainly did," said his chum, who observing the rapidity of his contact with the washbasin, the reappearance of the dicky and the two strokes of the brush which completed his toilette, added with a sigh of relief, "I say, old horse, you look more natural." Skippy immediately returned to the convenient Tina Tanner. He picked up the statuesquely posed photograph, contemplated it and returned it to its place with the air of a man on whom a great passion has burned itself out. "She was an awfully decent little sort," he said meditatively, "but it would have been an awful mess if I'd done it." "Done what?" "Followed her on the stage." "Say, whatever made you think you'd succeed on the stage, you chump?" said Snorky, who always retained a lingering doubt when Skippy grew confidential. "Oh, I don't know." "Well, the way you got off 'Horatius at the Bridge'--" Skippy stretched his arms and yawned deliciously. "Gee, but a fellow can make an awful fool of himself," he said, thinking now not of the fictitious Tina but of the explanations which must have taken place between his sister and Miss Lafontaine. "A nice wreck you'd have made of your life, you big boob," said Snorky taking up the photograph and smelling it curiously to see what perfume an actress employed. "So her name's Tanner, eh?" "Her stage name." "You couldn't have married a woman like that." "Not a word against her." "Well, anyhow are you vaccinated?" "Bitten, vaccinated and cured!" * * * * * Now when Skippy spoke thus from his heart it was in absolute faith, without the slightest suspicion of the natural course which a habit inevitably must take. A habit is after all but an acquired appetite, and what appetite was ever begun with instant enjoyment! No inveterate smoker ever appreciated his first cigar and the most persistent of tipplers choked once over the first distasteful introduction to the demon rum.