UKRIDGE SEES HER THROUGH
The girl from the and had a but speaking eye. At it had registered nothing but and the to please. But now, from that notebook, it met mine with a look of bewilderment. There was an of on her face, as of a good woman put upon. I read what was in her mind as as if she had been to it. She me a fool. And as this the thing unanimous, for I had been the same myself for the last of an hour, I that the painful must now terminate.
It was Ukridge who had let me in for the thing. He had my with of who were able to turn out five thousand a day by their to a of it; and though I at the time that he was trying to up for the in which his friend Dora Mason was now a partner, the of the idea had me. Like all writers, I had a for solid work, and this to offer a way out, into a tête-à-tête chat. It was only when those looked into mine and that pencil itself to record the of my that I what I was up against. For fifteen minutes I had been all the of a man who, called upon to make a public speech, too late that his brain has been and replaced by a substitute: and I was through.
“I’m sorry,” I said, “but I’m it’s not much use going on. I don’t able to manage it.”
Now that I had come out into the open and my idiocy, the girl’s softened. She closed her notebook forgivingly.
“Lots of people can’t,” she said. “It’s just a knack.”
“Everything to go out of my head.”
“I’ve often it must be very difficult to dictate.”
Two minds with but a single thought, in fact. Her sweet reasonableness, with the that the thing was over, in me a to babble. One has the same when the lets one out of his chair.
“You’re from the Norfolk Street Agency, aren’t you?” I said. A question, that I had them up on the telephone and asked them to send somebody round; but I was still the of the ether.
“Yes.”
“That’s in Norfolk Street, isn’t it? I mean,” I on hurriedly, “I wonder if you know a Miss Mason there? Miss Dora Mason.”
She surprised.
“My name is Dora Mason,” she said.
I was surprised, too. I had not that partners in to going out on these errands. And I was of a return of my embarrassment, feeling—quite unreasonably, for I had only her once in my life, and then from a distance—that I ought to have her.
“We were short-handed at the office,” she explained, “so I came along. But how do you know my name?”
“I am a great friend of Ukridge’s.”
“Why, of course! I was why your name was so familiar. I’ve him talk so much about you.”
And after that we did settle to the tête-à-tête of which I had had visions. She was a girl, the only in her being an respect for Ukridge’s and abilities. I, who had that of the from up and was still the memory of the night when he had my dress clothes, have her of him, but it to her dreams.
“He was about this type-writing business,” she said. “It was such a opportunity, and but for Mr. Ukridge I should have had to let it slip. You see, they were two hundred for the partnership, and I only had a hundred. And Mr. Ukridge on up the of the money. You see—I don’t know if he told you—he that he ought to do something he says he me the position I had with his aunt. It wasn’t his fault at all, really, but he saying that if I hadn’t gone to that with him I shouldn’t have got late and been dismissed. So——”
She was a talker, and it was only now that I was able to on the which she had in the opening of her speech. So had been the of those on me that I had her remarks.
“Did you say that Ukridge on the rest?” I gasped.
“Yes. Wasn’t it of him?”
“He gave you a hundred pounds? Ukridge!”
“Guaranteed it,” said Miss Mason. “I to pay a hundred and the in sixty days.”
“But the is not paid in sixty days?”
“Well, then I’m I should my hundred. But it will be, of course. Mr. Ukridge told me to have no about that at all. Well, good-bye, Mr. Corcoran. I must be going now. I’m sorry we didn’t results with the dictating. I should think it must be very difficult to do till you used to it.”
Her as she out me as one of the most I had seen. Poor child, off so when her whole rested on Ukridge’s ability to a hundred pounds! I that he was on one of those Utopian of his which were to him in thousands—“at a estimate, laddie!”—and not for the time in a of years the came to me that Ukridge ought to be in some of a home. A in many respects, but not a man to be allowed at large.
I was this train of when the of the door, by a of on the stairs and a noise without, his arrival.
“I say, laddie,” said Ukridge, entering the room, as was his habit, like a north-easterly gale, “was that Dora Mason I saw going the street? It looked like her back. Has she been here?”
“Yes. I asked her agency to send someone to take dictation, and she came.”
Ukridge out for the tobacco jar, his pipe, his pouch, on to the sofa, the cushions, and an upon me.
“Corky, my boy,” said Ukridge, “what I like about you and the why I always maintain that you will be a great man one of these days is that you have Vision. You have the big, broad, outlook. You’re not too proud to take advice. I say to you, ‘Dictate your stuff, it’ll pay you,’ and, damme, you go off and do it. No or shilly-shallying. You just go and do it. It’s the that to success. I like to see it. Dictating will add thousands a year to your income. I say it advisedly, laddie—thousands. And if you continue leading a and life and save your pennies, you’ll be at the way your will up. Money at five cent. itself every fourteen years. By the time you’re forty——”
It to a note after all these compliments, but it had to be done.
“Never mind about what’s going to to me when I’m forty,” I said. “What I want to know is what is all this I about you Miss Mason a hundred quid?”
“Ah, she told you? Yes,” said Ukridge, airily, “I it. Matter of conscience, old son. Man of honour, no alternative. You see, there’s no away from it, it was my fault that she was by my aunt. Got to see her through, laddie, got to see her through.”
I at the man.
“Look here,” I said, “let’s this thing straight. A of days ago you touched me for five and said it would save your life.”
“It did, old man, it did.”
“And now you’re talking of hundred about the place as if you were Rothschild. Do you it or it with a needle?”
There was pain in Ukridge’s as he sat up and at me through the smoke.
“I don’t like this tone, laddie,” he said, reproachfully. “Upon my Sam, it me. It as if you had in me, in my vision.”
“Oh, I know you’ve got vision. And the big, broad, outlook. Also snap, ginger, enterprise, and ears that out at right like the of a windmill. But that doesn’t help me to where on earth you to a hundred quid.”
Ukridge tolerantly.
“You don’t I would have the money for little Dora unless I where to my hands on it, do you? If you ask me, Have I got the at this moment? I reply, No, I haven’t. But it’s on the horizon, laddie, on the horizon. I can the of its wings.”
“Is Battling Billson going to someone and make your again?”
Ukridge winced, and the look of pain across his once more.
“Don’t mention that man’s name to me, old horse,” he begged. “Every time I think of him to go all black. No, the thing I have on hand now is a solid proposition. Gilt-edged, you might call it. I ran into a the other day I used to know out in Canada.”
“I didn’t know you had been in Canada,” I interrupted.
“Of I’ve been in Canada. Go over there and ask the you meet if I was in Canada. Canada! I should say I had been in Canada. Why, when I left Canada, I was off on the by a of policemen. Well, I ran into this in Piccadilly. He was up and and looking lost. Couldn’t make out what the he was doing over here, because, when I him, he hadn’t a cent. Well, it that he got up with Canada and over to America to try and make his fortune. And, by Jove, he did, out of the box. Bought a of land about the size of a pocket-handkerchief in Texas or Oklahoma or somewhere, and one morning, when he was the or or something, out a great oil-well. Apparently that of thing’s every day out there. If I a of together, I’m if I wouldn’t go to Texas myself. Great open where men are men, laddie—suit me to the ground. Well, we got talking, and he said that he to settle in England. Came from London as a kid, but couldn’t it at any price now they had it so much. I told him the thing for him to do was to a house in the country with a of shooting, and he said, ‘Well, how do you a house in the country with a of shooting?’ and I said, ‘Leave it in my hands, old horse. I’ll see you’re right.’ So he told me to go ahead, and I to Farmingdons, the house-agent in Cavendish Square. Had a with the manager. Very old bird with moth-eaten whiskers. I said I’d got a looking for a house in the country. ‘Find him one, laddie,’ I said, ‘and we the commish.’ He said ‘Right-o,’ and any day now I to that he’s up something suitable. Well, you can see for what that’s going to mean. These house-agent take it as a personal if a client away from them with anything a collar-stud and the he up in, and I’m in halves. Reason it out, my boy, it out.”
“You’re sure this man has money?”
“Crawling with it, laddie. Hasn’t out yet there’s anything smaller than a five-pound note in circulation. He took me to lunch, and when he the waiter the man into and him on cheeks.”
I am to admit that I in my mind, for it did as though the of Miss Mason rested on ground. I had that Ukridge be with so a scheme, and I said so. In fact, I my approval, for it him to borrow another five shillings; and he left we were in over a which was to my him a in one solid payment. Business business.
For the next ten days I saw nothing of Ukridge. As he was in the of making these disappearances, I did not worry as to the of my boy, but I was from time to time of a mild wonder as to what had of him. The was solved one night when I was walking through Pall Mall on my way home after a late session with an actor who was going into vaudeville, and to I hoped,—mistakenly, as it out—to sell a one-act play.
I say night, but it was nearly two in the morning. The were black and deserted, was everywhere, and all London slept Ukridge and a friend of his I came upon Hardy’s shop. That is to say, Ukridge was the shop. His friend was on the with his against a lamp-post.
As as I see in the light, he was a man of middle age, of and about the temples. I was able to his temples because—doubtless from the best motives—he was his on his left foot. He was in dress clothes, but his was a little by a of across his shirt-front and the that at some point in the he had either away or been of his tie. He at the with a poached-egg-like stare. He was the only man I had who was two at the same time.
Ukridge me with the of a the army.
“My dear old horse! Just the man I wanted!” he cried, as if he had me out of a number of applicants. “You can give me a hand with Hank, laddie.”
“Is this Hank!” I enquired, at the sportsman, who had now closed his as if the of the had to pall.
“Yes. Hank Philbrick. This is the I was telling you about, the who wants the house.”
“He doesn’t to want any house. He looks satisfied with the great open spaces.”
“Poor old Hank’s a under the weather,” Ukridge, his friend with sympathy. “It takes him this way. The is, old man, it’s a mistake for these to come into money. They things. The only thing Hank got to drink for the fifty years of his life was water, with as a on his birthday, and he’s trying to make up for time. He’s only just that there are such as in the world, and he’s making them a hobby. Says they’re such a colour. It wouldn’t be so if he to one at a time, but he making experiments. Mixes them, laddie. Orders the whole and them in a tankard. Well, I to say,” said Ukridge reasonably, “you can’t take more than five or six of mixed benedictine, chartreuse, kummel, crème de menthe, and old without the a bit. Especially if you up on and burgundy.”
A ran through me at the thought. I at the on the with a on awe.
“Does he really?”
“Every night for the last two weeks. I’ve been with him most of the time. I’m the only he’s got in London, and he to have me round.”
“What plans have you for his future? His future, I mean. Do we remove him or is he going to the night out here under the stars?”
“I thought, if you would a hand, old man, we him to the Carlton. He’s there.”
“He won’t be long, if he comes in in this state.”
“Bless you, my dear old man, they don’t mind. He the night-porter twenty yesterday and asked me if I it was enough. Lend a hand, laddie. Let’s go.”
I a hand, and we went.
The which that had upon me was to the that in acting as agent for Mr. Philbrick in the purchase of a house Ukridge was on to a good thing. What little I had of Hank had me that he was not the man to be about price. He would pay they asked him without hesitation. Ukridge would make out of his of the to pay off Dora Mason’s hundred without it. Indeed, for the time in his life he would be in of that of of which he was to speak so wistfully. I ceased, therefore, to worry about Miss Mason’s and myself on my own troubles.
They would have to anyone else minor troubles, but they were big to me. Two days after my meeting with Ukridge and Mr. Philbrick in Pall Mall I had a letter.
There was a Society paper for which at that time I did occasional work and to do more; and the of this paper had sent me a ticket for the of the Pen and Ink Club, with to let him have a and a of matter. It was only after I had the that here was a of needed cash on me out of a clear sky that I why the Pen and Ink Club to have a familiar ring. It was the of which Ukridge’s aunt Julia was the popular and president, and the of a second meeting with that woman me with a gloom. I had not forgotten—and would forget—my with her in her drawing-room at Wimbledon.
I was not in a financial position, however, to their whims, so the thing had to be gone through; but the me, and I was still on it when a ring at the front-door in on my meditations. It was by the of Ukridge’s voice if I were in. A moment later he had into the room. His were wild, his pince-nez at an of forty-five, and his from its by a of inches. His whole some of fate, and I was not when his an heart.
“Hank Philbrick,” said Ukridge without preamble, “is a son of Belial, a leper, and a worm.”
“What’s now?”
“He’s let me down, the weak-minded Tishbite! Doesn’t want that house in the country after all. My gosh, if Hank Philbrick is the of man Canada is producing nowadays, Heaven help the British Empire.”
I my troubles. They this tragedy.
“What him his mind?” I asked.
“The wobbling, hell-hound! I always had a that there was something with that man. He had a nasty, eye. You’ll me out, laddie, in that? Haven’t I spoken to you a hundred times about his eye?”
“Certainly. Why did he his mind?”
“Didn’t I always say he wasn’t to be trusted?”
“Repeatedly. What him his mind?”
Ukridge laughed with a that nearly the window-pane. His like a live thing. Ukridge’s was always a of that registered the of his feelings. Sometimes, when his temperature was normal, it would to its for minutes at a time; but the touch of sent it jumping up, and the more he was moved the higher it jumped.
“When I Hank out in Canada,” he said, “he had the of an ox. Ostriches took his in digestion. But directly he comes into a of money——Laddie,” said Ukridge earnestly, “when I’m a rich man, I want you to at my and watch me very carefully. The moment you see of speak a word. Don’t let me myself. Don’t let me about my health. Where was I? Oh yes. Directly this man comes into a of money he the idea that he’s a of fragile, flower.”
“I shouldn’t have so from what you were telling me the other night.”
“What the other night was the of all the trouble. Naturally he up with a of a head.”
“I can it.”
“Yes, but my gosh, what’s a head! In the old days he would have gone and it off by taking a of pain-killer and half-a-dozen trees. But now what happens? Having all this money, he wouldn’t take a like that. No, sir! He to one of those Harley Street who a of for saying ‘Well, how are we this morning?’ A move, laddie. Naturally, the was all over him. Tapped him here and him there, said he was down, and told him he ought to six months in a dry, sunny climate. Recommended Egypt. Egypt, I’ll trouble you, for a who fifty years that it was a town in Illinois. Well, the long and the of it is that he’s gone off for six months, doesn’t want a place in England, and I he by a crocodile. And the all out and to sign. Upon my Sam, it’s a little hard. Sometimes I wonder it’s while going on struggling.”
A upon us. Ukridge, in reverie, at his stud. I with a heart.
“What will your friend Dora do now?” I said at length.
“That’s what’s me,” said Ukridge, lugubriously. “I’ve been trying to think of some other way of that hundred, but at the moment I don’t mind I am baffled. I can see no daylight.”
Nor I. His of a hundred by any means of into the Mint indeed.
“Odd the way happen,” I said. I gave him the editor’s letter. “Look at that.”
“What’s this?”
“He’s sending me to do an article on the Pen and Ink Club dance. If only I had been to see your aunt——”
“And such a of it.”
“I didn’t make a of it. It just that——”
“All right, laddie, all right,” said Ukridge, tonelessly. “Don’t let’s straws. The remains, it’s your fault or not, the thing was a complete frost. What were you saying?”
“I was saying that, if only I had been to your aunt, I have met her in a perfectly natural way at this dance.”
“Done Young Disciple stuff,” said Ukridge, on the idea. “Rubbed in the that you do her a of good by her in the paper.”
“And asked her to re-engage Miss Mason as her secretary.”
Ukridge with the letter.
“You don’t think now——”
I was sorry for him and for Dora Mason, but on this point I was firm.
“No, I don’t.”
“But consider, laddie,” Ukridge. “At this she may well be in mood. The lights, the music, the laughter, the jollity.”
“No,” I said. “It can’t be done. I can’t out of going to the affair, if I did I’d any more work to do for this paper. But I’ll tell you one thing. I to keep clear of your aunt. That’s final. I of her in the night sometimes and wake up screaming. And in any case it wouldn’t be any use my her. She wouldn’t to me. It’s too late. You weren’t there that at Wimbledon, but you can take it from me that I’m not one of her circle of friends.”
“That’s the way it always happens,” Ukridge. “Everything comes too late. Well, I’ll be off. Lot of to do, laddie. Lot of thinking.”
And he left without a cigar, a sure that his was recuperation.
The of the Pen and Ink Club was held, like so many functions of its kind, at the Lotus Rooms, Knightsbridge, that barrack-like which to only for these sad affairs. The Pen and Ink in for quality in its membership than quantity; and the band, when I arrived, was out the which always produce in very large rooms that are only one-sixth part full. The air was and and a to prevail. The dancing on the of appeared and introspective, as if they were on the and that all is as grass. Around the room on those chairs which are only in subscription-dance beings were talking in undertones, about the of Scandinavian literature. In fact, the only spot on the whole was that it the of tortoiseshell-rimmed spectacles.
That which always me when I am with people in the was not by the that at any moment I might Miss Julia Ukridge. I moved about the room, alert, like a cat that has into a and sees in every the of a half-brick. I nothing but and from such a meeting. The lesson which I had from my previous with her was that for me in as away from Miss Julia Ukridge as possible.
“Excuse me!”
My had been in vain. She had up on me from behind.
“Good evening,” I said.
It is any good these in advance. They always turn out so differently. I had been assuming, when I into this hall, that if I met this woman I should the same of and which had proved so at Wimbledon. I had to make for the that that painful had taken place on her own ground, and that right from the start my had been from clear. To-night the were different.
“Are you a of the Pen and Ink Club?” said Ukridge’s aunt, frostily.
Her were on me with an that was not loathing, but a cold and contempt. So might a cook look at a black-beetle in her kitchen.
“No,” I replied, “I am not.”
I and hostile. This woman gave me a pain in the neck, and I to as much in the language of the eyes.
“Then will you tell me what you are doing here? This is a private dance.”
One has one’s moments. I much as I Battling Billson must have in his with Alf Todd, when he his upon him wide-open, the knock-out punch.
“The of Society sent me a ticket. He wanted an article about it.”
If I was like Mr. Billson, Ukridge’s aunt must have very like Mr. Todd. I see that she was shaken. In a I had from a black-beetle to a god-like creature, able, if conciliated, to do a of that log-rolling which is so dear to the of the female novelist. And she had not me. Of all sad of or pen, the are these: It might have been. It is too much to say that her fell, but the of this black moment her to part in a of despair. But there was good in this woman. She gamely.
“A Press ticket,” she murmured.
“A Press ticket,” I echoed.
“May I see it?”
“Certainly.”
“Thank you.”
“Not at all.”
She passed on.
I my of the dancers with a heart. In my present mood they did not appear so as they had a minutes back. Some of them, a of them, looked almost human. The was now, and to my or not, the to have taken on a cheeriness. The old of a still lingered, but now it was possible to think of it as a less formal, funeral. I to be that I had come.
“Excuse me!”
I had that I was with this of thing for the evening, and I with a little impatience. It was a voice that had me, and it was a tenor-looking man I saw. He was and fattish, with a Jovian and pince-nez to a black cord.
“Pardon me,” said this man, “but are you a of the Pen and Ink Club?”
My vanished, for it to me that, looked at in the proper light, it was flattering, this on the part of these people to the that I be one of them. No doubt, I felt, they were taking up the position of the of a night-club, who, when for of by a lady to he had on the ground that she was not a fit person to with his members, to the that he had meant it as a compliment.
“No, thank Heaven!” I replied.
“Then what——”
“Press ticket,” I explained.
“Press ticket? What paper?”
“Society .”
There was nothing of the Julia Ukridge in this man, no which him and indifferent. He like the sun. He my arm and it. He about me like a in the springtime.
“My dear fellow!” he exclaimed, exuberantly, and my arm more firmly, now I might him. “My dear fellow, I must apologise. I would not have questioned you, but there are some present who were not invited. I met a man only a moment ago who said that he had a ticket. Some mistake. There were no for sale. I was about to question him further, but he into the and I have not him since. This is a private dance, open only to members of the club. Come with me, my dear fellow, and I will give you a particulars which you may of use for your article.”
He me into a small room off the floor, closed the door to prevent escape, and, on the on which you a cat’s with to it to settle in a new home, to about with and cigarettes.
“Do, do down.”
I sat down.
“First, about this club. The Pen and Ink Club is the only of its in London. We ourselves on the fact. We are to the world what Brooks’s and the Carlton are to the social. Members are elected by invitation. Election, in short, you understand, is in the nature of an accolade. We have one hundred members, and we only those who in our opinion vision.”
“And the big, broad, outlook?”
“I your pardon?”
“Nothing.”
“The names of most of those here to-night must be very familiar to you.”
“I know Miss Ukridge, the president,” I said.
A faint, almost passed over the man’s face. He his pince-nez and them with a touch of disfavour. There was a note in his voice.
“Ah, yes,” he said, “Julia Ukridge. A dear soul, but ourselves, ourselves, not a great of help in an executive capacity.”
“No!”
“No. In confidence, I do all the work. I am the club’s secretary. My name, by the way, is Charlton Prout. You may know it?”
He me wistfully, and I that something ought to be done about him. He was much too sleek, and he had no right to do his like that.
“Of course,” I said. “I have read all your books.”
“Really?”
“‘A Shriek in the Night.’ ‘Who Killed Jasper Bossom?’—all of them.”
He austerely.
“You must be me with some other—ah—writer,” he said. “My work is on different lines. The the of thing I do as Pastels in Prose. My best-liked book, I believe, is Grey Myrtles. Dunstable’s it out last year. It was well received. And I do a good of work for the class of review.” He paused. “If you think it would your readers,” he said, with a of the hand, “I will send you a photograph. Possibly your would like to use it.”
“I he would.”
“A photograph somehow to—as it were—set off an article of this kind.”
“That,” I replied, cordially, “is what it doesn’t do nothing else but.”
“And you won’t Grey Myrtles. Well, if you have your cigarette, we might be returning to the ballroom. These people on me to keep going, you know.”
A of music us as he opened the door, and in that moment I had an odd that it different. That had gone from it. And as we from a and came in of the floor, I why.
The was full. It was crammed, jammed, and overflowing. Where had moved as single spies, they were now in battalions. The place was alive with noise and laughter. These people might, as my had said, be on him to keep going, but they to have been along well in his absence. I paused and the in astonishment. I not make the man’s balance.
“I you said the Pen and Ink Club had only a hundred members.”
The was for his glasses. He had an almost Ukridge-like of his pince-nez in moments of emotion.
“It—it has,” he stammered.
“Well, reading from left to right, I make it nearer seven hundred.”
“I cannot it.”
“Perhaps they have been having a new election and in some without vision,” I suggested.
I was aware of Miss Ukridge upon us, bristling.
“Mr. Prout!”
The author of Grey Myrtles convulsively.
“Yes, Miss Ukridge?”
“Who are all these people?”
“I—I don’t know,” said the man.
“You don’t know! It’s your to know. You are the of the club. I that you out as as possible who they are and what they they are doing here.”
The had something of the air of a man leading a hope, and his ears had pink, but he at it bravely. A serene-looking man with a light and a made-up tie was passing, and he upon him like a leopard.
“Excuse me, sir.”
“Eh?”
“Will you kindly—would you mind—pardon me if I ask——”
“What are you doing here?” Miss Ukridge, curtly, in on his with a impatience. “How do you come to be at this dance?”
The man surprised.
“Who, me?” he said. “I came with the of ’em.”
“What do you mean, the of them?”
“The members of the Warner’s Stores Social and Outing Club.”
“But this is the of the Pen and Ink Club,” Mr. Prout.
“Some mistake,” said the other, confidently. “It’s a of some kind. Here,” he added, to a of middle age who was by, “you’d have a talk with our hon. sec. He’ll know. Mr. Biggs, this to think there’s been some mistake about this dance.”
Mr. Biggs stopped, looked, and listened. Seen at close range, he had a forceful, air. I liked his looks.
“May I Mr. Charlton Prout?” I said. “Author of Grey Myrtles. Mr. Prout,” I on, as this to make little or no sensation, “is the of the Pen and Ink Club.”
“I’m the of the Warner’s Stores Social and Outing Club,” said Mr. Biggs.
The two each other warily, like two dogs.
“But what are you doing here?” Mr. Prout, in a voice like the wind in the tree-tops. “This is a private dance.”
“Nothing of the kind,” said Mr. Biggs, resolutely. “I personally for all my members.”
“But there were no for sale. The was for the exclusive——”
“It’s perfectly that you have come to the or the evening,” Miss Ukridge, Mr. Prout in the command. I did not her for a little impatient. The was the very feebly.
The man the Warner’s Stores Social and Outing Club a but at this new enemy. I liked his looks more than ever. This was a man who would it out on these lines if it took all the summer.
“I have not the of this lady’s acquaintance,” he said, smoothly, but with a eye. The Biggses, that to say, were to upon women, but if the asked for it they be men of iron, ruthless. “Might I ask who this lady is?”
“This is our president.”
“Happy to meet you, ma’am.”
“Miss Ukridge,” added Mr. Prout, the introduction.
The name appeared to a in Mr. Biggs. He and a of came into his eyes.
“Ukridge, did you say?”
“Miss Julia Ukridge.”
“Then it’s all right,” said Mr. Biggs, briskly. “There’s been no mistake. I our from a named Ukridge. I got seven hundred at five apiece, for taking a quantity and ten cent. discount for cash. If Mr. Ukridge to instructions, it’s too late to the now. You should have it clear to him what you wanted him to do he and did it.”
And with this the of the Warner’s Stores Social and Outing Club on the of his dancing-pump and was gone. And I, too, away. There nothing to keep me. As I went, I looked over my shoulder. The author of Grey Myrtles appeared to be entering upon the opening of what promised to be a painful tête-à-tête. My for him. If a man was Mr. Prout was, but the president of the Pen and Ink Club was not the woman to allow a like that to in her way.
“Oh, it just came to me, laddie,” said Stanley Featherstonehaugh Ukridge modestly, later by our representative. “You know me. One moment mind a blank, then—bing!—some idea. It was your me that ticket for the that set me thinking. And I to meet a in a who in Warner’s Stores. Nice fellow, with a amount of pimples. Told me their Social and Outing Club was up for its semi-annual beano. One thing to another, I got him to me to the hon. sec., and we came to terms. I liked the man, laddie. Great to meet a with a good, level head. We settled the in no time. Well, I don’t mind telling you, Corky my boy, that at last for the time in many years I to see my way clear. I’ve got a of now. After sending little Dora her hundred, I shall have at least fifty left over. Fifty quid! My dear old son, you may take it from me that there’s no limit—absolutely no limit—to what I can with fifty o’goblins in my kick. From now on I see my way clear. My are on solid ground. The world, laddie, is my oyster. Nothing can stop me from making a fortune. I’m not exaggerating, old horse—a fortune. Why, by a year from now I calculate, at a estimate——”
Our then withdrew.
