You all of you remember Mervyn Esmond, he of the spats, the eyeglass and grey top-hat, the Super-Knut of the Frivolity Theatre who used to gambol so gracefully before the many "twinkling toes" of the Super-Beauty Chorus, singing "Billy of Piccadilly." You must remember Mervyn Esmond! But that was the Esmond of yore, for a long time past he has been doing sterling work in command of an Army Pierrot troupe. I sat down beside him, stole his ice and finished it for him. "And now what are you doing here?" I asked. "I've come down from the line to get some new dresses for Queenie," he replied. "She--he, that is--is absolutely in rags, bursts a pair of corsets and a pair of silk stockings every performance, very expensive item." I had better explain here and now that Queenie is the leading lady in Mervyn's troupe. She--he, that is--started her--his--military career as an artillery driver, but was discovered to be the possessor of a very shrill falsetto voice and dedicated to female impersonations forthwith. "She--he--is round at the dressmaker's now," Mervyn went on, "wrestling with half a dozen _hysterical_ mannequins. I'm getting her--him, I should say--up regardless. Listen. Dainty ninon georgette outlined with chenile stitching. Charmeuse overtunic, embroidered with musquash and skunk pom-poms. Crêpe de Chine undies interwoven with blue baby ribbon, camis----" "Stop!" I thundered. "Do you want me to blush myself to death? I am but a rough soldier." Mervyn apologised, wrapped himself round another ice and asked me how I was amusing myself in Tiber-town. Having first ascertained that there were no enemy agents secreted under the table or among the potted palms, I unburdened my soul to him concerning Wilbur and the coups that never came off. He stared at me for a few moments, his eyes twinkling, then he leaned over the table. "My active brain has evolved a be-autiful plan," said he. "It's yours for another ice." I bought it. * * * * * * * * I found Wilbur sleuthing the crowd from behind a tall tumbler in the Excelsior lounge, and dragging him into the lift, hung it up half-way between here and hereafter, and whispered my great news. "Where, when?" he cried, blench-blanching. "In my hotel at midnight," I replied. "I hid in a clothes-basket and heard all. We will frustrate their knavish tricks, thou and I." Wilbur did not appear to be as keen as I had expected, he hummed and hawed and chatted about my amateurishness and impetuosity; but I was obdurate, and taking him firmly by the arm led him off to dinner. I hardly let go of his arm at all for the next five hours, judging it safer so. Five minutes before midnight I led him up the stairs of my hotel and tip-toeing into a certain room, clicked on the light.