Antonio Giuseppe the donkey will never smile again, dear reader. With his edges trimmed and "Welcome" branded across his back he may serve as a mangy door-mat for some suburban maisonette, but at the present moment he lies in the mud of the parade-ground, as flat as a sole on a sand-bank, waiting for someone to roll him up and carry him away. When a full-fed Major-General falls he falls heavily. XXII "I SPY" I put my head into the Mess and discovered Albert Edward alone there cheating himself at Patience. "My leave warrant has come and I'm off!" said I. "If Foch should ring up tell him he'll have to struggle along by himself for a fortnight. Cheeroh!" "Cheeroh!" said Albert Edward. "Give my regards to Nero, Borgia and all the boys." I shut the door upon him and took the road to Rome. Arrived there I attempted to shed a card on the Pope, but was repulsed by a halbardier in fancy dress; visited the catacombs (by the way, in the art of catacombing we latter-day sinners have nothing to learn from the early saints. Why, at Arras in 1917 we---- Oh, well, never mind now!); kept a solemn face while bands solemnly intoned Tipperary (under the impression it was the British National Anthem); bought a bushel of mosaic brooches and several million picture postcards and acted the perfect little tripper throughout. Then one day while stepping into a hotel lift I bumped full into Wilfrid Wilcox Wilbur, stepping forth. You have all of you read the works of Wilfrid Wilcox Wilbur (_Passion Flowers_, _Purple Patches_, etc. Boost and Boom. 6s.); if you haven't you should, for Wilfrid is the lad to handle the soul-sob and the heart-throb and warm up cold print generally. In pre-war days he was to be met with in London drawing-rooms about tea-time wearing his mane rather longer than is done in the best menageries, giving a very realistic imitation of a lap-dog. And now behold him in military disguise parading the Eternal City! "What are you doing here?" I gasped. He put a finger to his lips. "Psst!" Then pushing me into the lift, he ejected the attendant, turned a handle and we shot aloft. Half-way between heaven and earth he stopped the conveyance and having made quite sure we were not being overheard by either men or angels, leaned up against my ear and whispered, "Secret Service!" I was amazed. "Not really!" Wilbur nodded. "Yes, really! That's why I have to be so careful; they have their agents everywhere listening, watching, taking notes." I felt for my pocket-case momentarily fearful that They (whoever They were) might have taken mine. "And do you have agents also, listening, noting, taking watches?" I asked.