another, 'Have you seen the Smith-Jenkins' magnolia? It is a
perfect mass of flowers,' or else 'Smith-Jenkins tells me there

won't be a single blossom on their magnolia this year; the east
winds have turned all the buds black.' Now if, when we had gone,

people still associated our names with the magnolia tree, no matter
who temporarily possessed it, if they said, 'Ah, that's the tree on

which the Gurtleberrys hung their cook because she sent up the wrong
kind of sauce with the asparagus,' that would be something really

due to our own initiative, apart from anything east winds or
magnolia vitality might have to say in the matter."

"We should never do such a thing," said the aunt.
The niece gave a reluctant sigh.

"I can't imagine it," she admitted. "Of course," she continued,
"there are heaps of ways of leading a real existence without

committing sensational deeds of violence. It's the dreadful little
everyday acts of pretended importance that give the Mappin stamp to

our life. It would be entertaining, if it wasn't so pathetically
tragic, to hear Uncle James fuss in here in the morning and

announce, 'I must just go down into the town and find out what the
men there are saying about Mexico. Matters are beginning to look

serious there.' Then he patters away into the town, and talks in a
highly serious voice to the tobacconist, incidentally buying an

ounce of tobacco; perhaps he meets one or two others of the world's
thinkers and talks to them in a highly serious voice, then he

patters back here and announces with increased importance, 'I've
just been talking to some men in the town about the condition of

affairs in Mexico. They agree with the view that I have formed,
that things there will have to get worse before they get better.'

Of course nobody in the town cared in the least little bit what his
views about Mexico were or whether he had any. The tobacconist

wasn't even fluttered at his buying the ounce of tobacco; he knows
that he purchases the same quantity of the same sort of tobacco

every week. Uncle James might just as well have lain on his back in
the garden and chattered to the lilac tree about the habits of

caterpillars."
"I really will not listen to such things about your uncle,"

protested Mrs. James Gurtleberry angrily.
"My own case is just as bad and just as tragic," said the niece,

dispassionately; "nearly everything about me is conventional make-
believe. I'm not a good dancer, and no one could honestly call me

good-looking, but when I go to one of our dull little local dances
I'm conventionally supposed to 'have a heavenly time,' to attract

the ardenthomage of the local cavaliers, and to go home with my
head awhirl with pleasurable recollections. As a matter of fact,

I've merely put in some hours of indifferent dancing, drunk some
badly-made claret cup, and listened to an enormousamount of

laborious light conversation. A moonlight hen-stealing raid with
the merry-eyed curate would be infinitely more exciting; imagine the

pleasure of carrying off all those white minorcas that the Chibfords
are always bragging about. When we had disposed of them we could

give the proceeds to a charity, so there would be nothing really
wrong about it. But nothing of that sort lies within the Mappined

limits of my life. One of these days somebody dull and decorous and
undistinguished will 'make himself agreeable' to me at a tennis

party, as the saying is, and all the dull old gossips of the
neighbourhood will begin to ask when we are to be engaged, and at

last we shall be engaged, and people will give us butter-dishes and
blotting-cases and framed pictures of young women feeding swans.

Hullo, Uncle, are you going out?"
"I'm just going down to the town," announced Mr. James Gurtleberry,

with an air of some importance: "I want to hear what people are
saying about Albania. Affairs there are beginning to take on a very

serious look. It's my opinion that we haven't seen the worst of
things yet."

In this he was probably right, but there was nothing in the
immediate or prospective condition of Albania to warrant Mrs.

Gurtleberry in bursting into tears.
FATE

Rex Dillot was nearly twenty-four, almost good-looking and quite
penniless. His mother was supposed to make him some sort of an

allowance out of what her creditors allowed her, and Rex
occasionally strayed into the ranks of those who earn fitful

salaries as secretaries or companions to people who are unable to
cope unaided with their correspondence or their leisure. For a few

months he had been assistant editor and business manager of a paper
devoted to fancy mice, but the devotion had been all on one side,

and the paper disappeared with a certain abruptness from club
reading-rooms and other haunts where it had made a gratuitous

appearance. Still, Rex lived with some air of comfort and well-
being, as one can live if one is born with a genius for that sort of

thing, and a kindly Providence usually arranged that his week-end
invitations coincided with the dates on which his one white dinner-

waistcoat was in a laundry-returned condition of dazzling cleanness.
He played most games badly, and was shrewd enough to recognise the

fact, but he had developed a marvellously accuratejudgement in
estimating the play and chances of other people, whether in a golf

match, billiard handicap, or croquet tournament. By dint of
parading his opinion of such and such a player's superiority with a

sufficient degree of youthful assertiveness he usually succeeded in
provoking a wager at liberal odds, and he looked to his week-end

winnings to carry him through the financial embarrassments of his
mid-week existence. The trouble was, as he confided to Clovis

Sangrail, that he never had enough available or even prospective
cash at his command to enable him to fix the wager at a figure

really worth winning.
"Some day," he said, "I shall come across a really safe thing, a bet

that simply can't go astray, and then I shall put it up for all I'm
worth, or rather for a good deal more than I'm worth if you sold me

up to the last button."
"It would be awkward if it didn't happen to come off," said Clovis.

"It would be more than awkward," said Rex; "it would be a tragedy.
All the same, it would be extremelyamusing to bring it off. Fancy

awaking in the morning with about three hundred pounds standing to
one's credit. I should go and clear out my hostess's pigeon-loft

before breakfast out of sheer good-temper."
"Your hostess of the moment mightn't have a pigeon-loft," said

Clovis.
"I always choose hostesses that have," said Rex; "a pigeon-loft is

indicative of a careless, extravagant, genialdisposition, such as I
like to see around me. People who strew corn broadcast for a lot of

feathered inanities that just sit about cooing and giving each other
the glad eye in a Louis Quatorze manner are pretty certain to do you

well."
"Young Strinnit is coming down this afternoon," said Clovis

reflectively; "I dare say you won't find it difficult to get him to
back himself at billiards. He plays a pretty useful game, but he's

not quite as good as he fancies he is."
"I know one member of the party who can walk round him," said Rex

softly, an alert look coming into his eyes; "that cadaverous-looking
Major who arrived last night. I've seen him play at St. Moritz. If

I could get Strinnit to lay odds on himself against the Major the
money would be safe in my pocket. This looks like the good thing

I've been watching and praying for."
"Don't be rash," counselled Clovis, "Strinnit may play up to his

self-imagined form once in a blue moon."
"I intend to be rash," said Rex quietly, and the look on his face

corroborated his words.
"Are you all going to flock to the billiard-room?" asked Teresa

Thundleford, after dinner, with an air of some disapproval and a
good deal of annoyance. "I can't see what particular amusement you

find in watching two men prodding little ivory balls about on a