morosely, how like Life it all was! We never know what the morrow may bring forth. We strike a pretty good patch and are beginning to think pretty well of ourselves, and along comes a George Parsloe.
"Of course I do," said Barbara. "Why, there he is."
The cab had drawn up at the door of the hotel, and on the porch George Parsloe was airing his graceful person. To Ferdinand's fevered eye he looked like a Greek god, and his inferiority complex began to exhibit symptoms of elephantiasis. How could he compete at love or golf with a fellow who looked as if he had stepped out of the movies and considered himself off his drive when he did a hundred and eighty yards?
"Geor-gee!" cried Barbara, blithely. "Hullo, George!"
"Why, hullo, Barbara!"
They fell into pleasant conversation, while Ferdinand hung miserably about in the offing. And presently, feeling that his society was not essential to their happiness, he slunk away.
GEORGE PARSLOE dined at the Cat-Stoker's table that night, and it was with George Parsloe that Barbara roamed in the moonlight after dinner. Ferdinand, after a profitless hour at the billiard-table, went early to his room. But not even the rays of the moon, glinting on his cup, could soothe the fever in his soul. He practised putting sombrely into his tooth-glass for a while; then, going to be, fell at last into a troubled sleep.
BARBARA slept late the next morning and breakfasted in her room. Coming down towards noon, she found a strange emptiness in the hotel. It was her experience of summer hotels that a really fine day like this one was the cue for half the inhabitants to collect in the lounge, shut all the windows, and talk about conditions in the jute industry. To her surprise, though the sun was streaming down from a cloudless sky, the only occupant of the lounge was the octogenarian with the ear-trumpet. She observed that he was chuckling to himself in a senile manner.
"Good morning," she said, politely, for she had made his acquaintance on the previous evening.
"Hey?" said the octogenarian, suspending his chuckling and getting his trumpet into position.
"I said 'Good morning!'" roared Barbara into the receiver.
"Hey?"
"Good morning!"
"Ah! Yes, it's a very fine morning, a very fine morning. If it wasn't for missing my bun and glass of milk at twelve sharp," said the octogenarian, "I'd be down on the links. That's where I'd be, down on the links. If it wasn't for missing my bun and glass of milk."
This refreshment arriving at this moment, he dismantled the radio outfit and began to restore his tissues.
"Watching the match," he explained, pausing for a moment in his bun-mangling.
"What match?"
The octogenarian sipped his milk.
"What match?" repeated Barbara.
"Hey?"
"What match?"
The octogenarian began to chuckle again and nearly swallowed a crumb the wrong way.
"Take some of the conceit out of him," he gurgled.
"Out of who?" asked Barbara, knowing perfectly well that she should have said "whom."
"Yes," said the octogenarian.
"Who is conceited?"
"Ah! This young fellow, Dibble. Very conceited. I saw it in his eye from the first, but nobody would listen to me. Mark my words, I said, that boy needs taking down a peg or two. Well, he's going to be this morning. Your uncle wired to young Parsloe to come down, and he's arranged a match between them. Dibble"—here the octogenarian choked again and had to rinse himself out with milk—"Dibble doesn't know that Parsloe once went round in ninety-four!"
"What?"
Everything seemed to go black to Barbara. Through a murky mist she appeared to be looking at a negro octogenarian sipping ink. Then her eyes cleared, and she found herself clutching for support at the back of a chair. She understood now. She realized why Ferdinand had been so distrait, and her whole heart went out to him in a spasm of maternal pity. How she had wronged him!
"Take some of the conceit out of him," the octogenarian was mumbling, and Barbara felt a sudden sharp loathing for the old man. For two pins she could have dropped a beetle in his milk. Then the need for action roused her. What action? She did not know. All she knew was that she must act.
"Oh!" she cried.
"Hey?" said the Octogenarian, bringing his trumpet to the ready.
But Barbara had gone.
IT was not far to the links, and Barbara covered the distance on flying feet. She reached the club-house, but the course was empty except for the Scooper, who was
