Myre turned a dirty putty colour. Noll got up from his chair and walked out of the club.... Bartholomew Doome rose languidly from a lounge: “It was a happy thing for your pink and white complexion, Myre, that Noll Baddlesmere has been too absent-minded to overhear your yawing. I do not think I have ever seen you glitter more consummately caddish. Besides which, you lied. But that’s a detail. To lie to save a woman’s honour has an air--to lie against her is to be banal. It has been done before--and so often.” He strolled towards the door. Myre said: “It is a happy thing for some people that the duel is dead.” Bartholomew Doome laughed--went out laughing--laughed the length of Piccadilly.... An urgent demand from the Secretary, asking for his subscription, Noll sent on to Mr. Fosse, with a waggish note: “DEAR FOSSE, I know from your own lips that I owe my election to the club to your kind offices; and I should be sorry indeed to think that my failure to pay my subscription may cast a slur upon you as my sponsor. I find that the sum that you borrowed from me when you won your success in _The Discriminator_ fully covers my subscription, and yields you a handsome profit, and I would beg that you take advantage of the admirable opportunity of paying your debt to me by paying my debt to the club; you will increase my indebtedness to you by withdrawing my name from the books. Yours, not wholly without admiration, NOLL BADDLESMERE.” Mr. Fosse, odd to say, paid the subscription. * * * * * When Quilliam O’Flaherty Macloughlin Myre called at Lady Persimmon’s the next day he was told that her ladyship was not at home. “But,” said my pushful gentleman--“I have just seen visitors go in.” The footman put himself across the doorway, barring entrance: “You are Mr. Myre, sir?” “Yes.” “Her ladyship has given instructions that she is never at home to persons of the name of Myre. Go away.” He slammed the door in the great man’s face. CHAPTER XXXVIII _Which has to do with the Breaking of a Pretty Lady’s Picture_