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order to laugh with an unnatural heartiness. “What’s it all about, eh?” Then before MacIan could get past his sprawling and staggering figure he ran forward again and said with a sort of shouting and ear-shattering whisper: “I say, my name is Wilkinson. You know—Wilkinson’s Entire was my grandfather. Can’t drink beer myself. Liver.” And he shook his head with extraordinary sagacity.

“We really are in a hurry, as you say,” said MacIan, summoning a sufficiently pleasant smile, “so if you will let us pass——”

“I’ll tell you what, you fellows,” said the sprawling gentleman, confidentially, while Evan’s agonised ears heard behind him the first paces of the pursuit, “if you really are, as you say, in a hurry, I know what it is to be in a hurry—Lord, what a hurry I was in when we all came out of Cartwright’s rooms—if you really are in a hurry—” and he seemed to steady his voice into a sort of solemnity—“if you are in a hurry, there’s nothing like a good yacht for a man in a hurry.”

“No doubt you’re right,” said MacIan, and dashed past him in despair. The head of the pursuing host was just showing over the top of