Jimmy in his tracks. The had him. He had been of Ann, but he had not her to out at him, her arms.
"What's the matter?" he enquired.
Ann him a side-street.
"You mustn't go to the house. Everything has gone wrong."
"Everything gone wrong? I I had a hit. I have with your uncle, anyway. We on the terms. We have to go to the ball-game together to-morrow. He is going to tell them at the office that Carnegie wants to see him."
"It isn't uncle Peter. It's aunt Nesta."
"Ah, there you touch my conscience. I was a little tactless, I'm afraid, with Ogden. It you came into the room. I that is the trouble?"
"It has nothing do with that," said Ann impatiently. "It's much worse. Aunt Nesta is suspicious. She has that you aren't Jimmy Crocker."
"Great Scott! How?"
"I to her down, but she still suspects. So now she has to wait and see if Skinner, the butler, you. If he doesn't, she will know that she was right."
Jimmy was puzzled.
"I don't the reasoning. Surely it's a of test. Why should she think a man cannot be and true unless her him? There must be hundreds of citizens he not know."
"Skinner from England a days ago. Until then he was by Mrs. Crocker. Now do you understand?"
Jimmy stopped. She had spoken slowly and distinctly, and there be no possibility that he had her, yet he that he had her aright. How a man named Skinner have been his step-mother's butler? Bayliss had been with the family since they had in London.
"Are you sure?"
"Of course, of I'm sure. Aunt Nesta told me herself. There can't possibly be a mistake, it was Skinner who let her in when she called on Mrs. Crocker. Uncle Peter told me about it. He had a talk with the man in the and that he was a enthusiast—"
A wild, idea upon Jimmy. It was so that he of it for a moment. But were these times, and it might be . . .
"What of looking man is Skinner?"
"Oh, stout, clean-shaven. I like him. He's much more than I were. Why?"
"Oh, nothing."
"Of course, you can't go to the house. You see that? He would say that you aren't Jimmy Crocker and then you would be arrested."
"I don't see that. If I am like Crocker for his friends to mistake me for him in restaurants, why shouldn't this mistake me, too?"
"But—?"
"And, consider. In any case, there's no done. If he fails to me when he opens the door to us, we shall know that the game is up: and I shall have of time to disappear. If the him, all will be well. I that we go to the house, ring the bell, and when he appears, I will say 'Ah, Skinner! Honest fellow!' or to that effect. He will either at me or on me like a watchdog. We will our on which way the jumps."
The of the died away. Footsteps were heard. Ann for Jimmy's arm and—clutched it.
"Now!" she whispered.
The door opened. Next moment Jimmy's was confirmed. Gaping at them from the open doorway, and in swallow-tails, his father. How he came to be there, and why he was there, Jimmy did not know. But there he was.
Jimmy had little in his father's as a man of discretion. The Crocker was one of those simple, people who, when surprised, do not their surprise, and who, not any in which they themselves, on the spot. Swift and action was on his part his parent, him on the steps of the one house in New York where he was least likely to be, should that would everything. He see the name Jimmy on Mr. Crocker's lips.
He his hand cheerily.
"Ah, Skinner, there you are!" he said breezily. "Miss Chester was telling me that you had left my step-mother. I you on the mine. I came over on the Caronia. I you didn't to see me again so soon, eh?"
A to pass over Mr. Crocker's face, it and serene. He had been his cue, and like the old actor he was he took it easily and without confusion. He a smile.
"No, indeed, sir."
He to allow them to enter. Jimmy Ann's as she passed him. It with and admiration, and it Jimmy like wine. As she moved the stairs, he gave to his by his father on the with a report that out like a pistol shot.
"What was that?" said Ann, turning.
"Something out on the Drive, I think," said Jimmy. "A car back-firing, I fancy, Skinner."
"Very probably, sir."
He Ann to the stairs. As he started to them, a his ears.
"'At-a-boy!"
It was Mr. Crocker's way of a father's blessing.
Ann walked into the drawing-room, her high, in the which she upon her aunt.
"Quite an little downstairs, aunt Nesta," she said. "The meeting of the old and the master. Skinner was almost overcome with and when he saw Jimmy!"
Mrs. Pett not check an exclamation.
"Did Skinner recognise—?" she began; then stopped herself abruptly.
Ann laughed.
"Did he Jimmy? Of course! He was likely to have him, surely? It isn't much more than a week since he was waiting on him in London."
"It was a very meeting," said Jimmy. "Rather like the of Ulysses and the Argos, of which this bright-eyed child here—" he Ogden on the head, a by that youth—"has no read in the of his into the Classics. I was Ulysses, Skinner the role of the dog."
Mrs. Pett was not sure she was or at this that her had been without foundation. On the whole, may be said to have preponderated.
"I have no he was pleased to see you again. He must have been very much astonished."
"He was!"
"You will be meeting another old friend in a minute or two," said Mrs. Pett.
Jimmy had been into a chair. This stopped him in mid-descent.
"Another!"
Mrs. Pett at the clock.
"Lord Wisbeach is to lunch."
"Lord Wisbeach!" Ann. "He doesn't know Jimmy."
"Eugenia me in London that he was one of your best friends, James."
Ann looked at Jimmy. She was again of that of not being able to with Fate's blows, of not having the to go on over the which Fate in her path.
Jimmy, for his part, was the that had Lord Wisbeach across his path. He saw that it only needed by one or two more of Jimmy Crocker to make Ann his identity. The that she had him with Bayliss in Paddington Station and had into the error of Bayliss to be his father had her from until now; but this not last forever. He Lord Wisbeach well, as a garrulous, who would talk about old times to such an as to Ann to the truth in the five minutes.
The door opened.
"Lord Wisbeach," Mr. Crocker.
"I'm I'm late, Mrs. Pett," said his lordship.
"No. You're punctual. Lord Wisbeach, here is an old friend of yours, James Crocker."
There was an almost pause. Then Jimmy and out his hand.
"Hello, Wizzy, old man!"
"H-hello, Jimmy!"
Their met. In his lordship's there was an of relief, with astonishment. His face, which had a white, as the blood into it. He had the of a man who had had a and is just over it. Jimmy, him curiously, was not at his emotion. What the man's game might be, he not say; but of one thing he was sure, which was that this was not Lord Wisbeach, but—on the contrary—some one he had in his life.
"Luncheon is served, madam!" said Mr. Crocker from the doorway.
