I may have been mistaken, but a sound uncommonly like the chambermaid's giggle came to me from the passage without. The sound of a car stopping outside the hotel drew me to the window as the waitress left me, and I was in time to see an old gentleman with a long white beard step from the interior of a Daimler landaulette, the door of which was held open by a dignified chauffeur, whose attire seemed to consist mainly of brass buttons. A consultation evidently took place in the smoking-room or bar between this patriarch and the proprietor, and then I heard agitated voices in the passage without. "It's a blinking invasion," said Mr. Gunthorpe. "I tell you we can't do it. Good heavens, they threaten to stop a month if they are comfortable." "Don't worry then, old bean. They won't stop long." This in the voice of boots. "And they want special diet. Old girl can't eat meat. Suffers from a duodenal ulcer. I tell you, we got quick intimate! We can't do it, Molly." "Fathead, of course we can. I'll concoct her something the like of which her what-you-may-call-it has never before tackled. Run along, Bill, and be affable." "Shall I stand them a drink?"--Mr. Gunthorpe again. "Do, old bean. I'll come and have one, too," said boots. "You won't, Bob. You'll see to the chauffeur and the car, _and_ the luggage." "Hang the luggage! I'll stand the chauffeur a drink." Then the female voice spoke warningly. "You've had enough drinks already, both of you," it said. "You ought to bear in mind that you're not running the hotel just for your two selves." "It's all right, old girl. There's plenty for everybody. Cellar's full of it." The voices died away, and I strolled out into the bar once more. Mr. Gunthorpe was being affable, according to instructions, to the old gentleman, while an old lady in a bonnet looked on piercingly. "Quite all right about the diet," the landlord was saying as I entered. "We make a specialty of special diets. In fact, our ordinary diet is a special diet. Certainly, of course. We've got mulligatawny soup, sardines, roast beef, trifle and gorgonzola cheese. Perhaps you'll have a drink while you wait?" "Certainly not, sir," replied the old gentleman testily. "You seem to be unable to comprehend. My wife has a duodenal ulcer, sir. Had it for fourteen years in September, and you talk to me of mulligatawny soup." "I quite understand, of course, of course," replied Mr. Gunthorpe urbanely. "Everything of a--an irritating character will be left out of the--" "Then it won't be mulligatawny soup, you fool!" exploded the old lady, whose pressure I had seen rising for some time. "Certainly not, madam. Of course, indubitably. We'll call it beef-tea, and it will never know." "What will never know?" asked the old gentleman, with an air of puzzlement. "Madam's duodenal ulcer, sir," replied the landlord, with a deferential bow, dedicated, doubtless, to that organ.