The Major spied Mr. Jope's broad back as he dipped and entered beneath the flap of the tent; and followed, elate at having run his quarry to earth. A stout woman, seated at the entrance beside a drum on which she counted her change, thrust out an arm of no mean proportions to block his entrance, and demanded twopence, fee for admission. The Major, who had forgotten this formality, dipped his hand into his breeches pocket and tendered her a guinea. She eyed it suspiciously, took it, rang it on the lid of her money-box, and, recognising it for a genuine coin, at once transferred her suspicions to him. "Tuppence out of a guinea?" she sniffed. "Not likely, with a man of _your_ looks." "It's genuine, ma'am." "I ain't a fool," answered the lady. "I was wondering how you came by it. Well, anyway, I can't give you change; so take yourself off, please." He argued, but she was obdurate. She hadn't the change about her, she affirmed, with a jerk of her thumb towards the interior of the tent. Their takings to-day hadn't amounted to five shillings, as she was a Christian woman. The Major, glancing beneath the tent-cloth, spied a melancholy man extracting ribbons from his mouth before an audience of three men, a child and a woman. He heard Ben Jope's voice raised in approval. He announced that he would wait outside until the performance concluded. "Twenty minutes," said the stout woman nonchalantly. "Good evening, ma'am," said he, and stepping back, began to pace to and fro in front of the tent. Why had he followed this man who, if you looked at it in one way, had been the prime cause of all his calamity? He smiled grimly at the thought that, as justice went in this world, he should be tracking Ben Jope down in a cold passion of revenge; whereas, in fact, he was hungry to grip the honest fellow's hand. From the panorama of these ten mischanced years the face of Ben Jope shone out as in a halo, wreathed with good-natured smiles. Ben Jope-- Here the Major flung up both hands and tottered back as, with a lift of the earth beneath his feet, a flame ripped the roof off the tent, and roaring, hurled it right and left into the night. Under the shock of the explosion he dropped on hands and knees, and, still on hands and knees, crawled forward to a ditch, a full ten yards to the left of the spot where the tent had stood. In the darkness one of the victims lay groaning. "Are--are you hurt?" The Major's teeth chattered as he crawled near and stretched out a hand towards the sufferer. "Damn the fellow!" swore Ben Jope cheerfully, sitting up. "What'll be his next trick, I wonder?" "You--you are not hurt?" "Hurt? No, I reckon. Who are you?" "Hymen, Ben--Solomon Hymen. You remember--in the Plymouth Theatre, ten years back. Oh, hush, man, hush!" for Ben, casting both hands up to his face, had let out a squeal like a rabbit's.