The Twelfth Hour

clothes were very smart, and who gave the impression of being at once in the highest spirits and at least a year in advance of the very l

any ideas, however valuable, that had been suggested earlier than, say, yesterday afternoon. Extremely good-natured, lively, and voluble, he was immensely popular, bein

d got a motor, Bert

of the window, arranged the garde

It's a ripper, the only right kind. It can go, I'll say that for

done anything else

e lau

lunching in it, but with it,-no, no, not with it, you know what I mean-with the dearest old gentleman who lives in the wilds of West Kensington. He's simply devoted to me. Why, I can't think. But he's got a sort of idea that I saved his life on

, is where you came

I made up quite a romance about the old gentleman. You're a reading man, Woodville, and so you know, from books, that the slightest politeness to an eccentric millionaire sets you up in gilded luxury for life, don't you? I expected, of course, that he would cut off his family with a shilling, and would leave me at the very least ￡20,000 a year. Isn't it funny, my being wrong? It turned out that he neither could nor would do anything of

etary to a foreign Duke, with a brilliant diplomatic future before you, o

ented a car of his own. I once permitted myself to speak rather disrespectfully of Broughton's quite ridiculous car, and, of co

st the car?" said Mervy

b into a motor, by means of a ladder, over the back! I understood that though Broughton's design had all sorts of capital new arran

, you know, and had an explanation, and sort of made it up, but I'm afraid, like tha

lunch with the old gentleman. Ca

heatre at one, to rehear

old boy. It's a quarter

ok thei

h from the chauffeur, Bertie sprang into th

y spun along, "I want to talk about Lady

now you k

seriously devoted to a perfect stranger than to a woman I know personally. But I've often seen her at the Opera. And I'm going to know

devoted to each other. T

s eyes

I should always be there or thereabouts, at all risks! You don't seem to understand (knowing them so intimately, of course you wouldn't) what Lady Chetwode is going to be. Why, she's

do you mean?"

t, and that is a flair for success. It will be all very w

ould marry any one els

and that sort of thing, and it would certainly bring her forward. Although I think she could do better.

omething wrong with your

ffeur's one of the best drivers in London. But,

are about that sort of

w there is nothing so uncomfortable as not having settled on one's pose. Oh!" Bertie gave a start.

le of Miss Crofton. You're gener

ow very well indeed. I met her last Tuesday, so she's quite an old friend. Mrs. Ogilvie's the pretty woman who thinks she has a Byzantine profile. S

hat hap

er everywhere. Nothing worse than that! Her frocks and her mots,-it seems she's very clever, I hear, and says the most delig

she's simply wrappe

all that. Besides, he goes racing. They say his horse has a chance of winning the Derby. Oh, you don't know what a distinguished family they are!

r do I," sai

ause I don't mind telling you I've

you had," said

the Rue de la Paix, all feathers, and said, Oh, quel joli mouvement, Madame! The poor girl, frightened to death, thinking the birds were alive, tore it off. So then they tried on those absurd, tiny, high, little things that require at least twenty-five imitation curls to keep them up, and show them off, and in which poor Miss Winter looked like an escaped lunatic. We tried everything in the shop, and at last Mrs. Ogilvie said, 'Perhaps we had better come again, later in the season, when the hats would be smaller, o

doesn't seem to have

ld order absurd beaded things, like Roman helmets, when of course she'd look delightful in a dark claret-coloured velvet sort of

t go into the millinery busine

s sake. But I do understand frocks. I will say that I think women's d

I d

d Street at a pace that the crowd

rt to me, always, to see Mrs. Crofton; it makes one feel at least there is something statio

a minute; I want

sed the road, and said, b

weather for the

oodville, smiling. "What ar

p, to get a song. One of those Sylvia doesn'

Bertie; "it's Pale Hands tha

t just

one Girl or something. Do tell us what

t all. It's Home swee

ade him to join the

he person to be friends with if you want anything fixed up! Well, here we are at Onslow Square. It was jolly seeing you again. You must come for another longer spin soon. Is

him act," said Woo