Marston Towers if you like, and other people besides. Very well, then;
let's go and see your precious old fortune-teller. You needn't say who I
am; say I'm a friend, and tell 'im never to mind about making mischief,
but to say right out where I am and what I've been doing all this time.
I have my 'opes it'll cure you of your superstitiousness."

[Illustration: "'Well, look 'ere,' said Mr. Boxer, 'I've told you my
story and I've got witnesses to prove it.'"]

"We'll go round after we've shut up, mother," said Mrs. Boxer. "We'll
have a bit o' supper first and then start early."

Mrs. Gimpson hesitated. It is never pleasant to submit one's
superstitions to the tests of the unbelieving, but after the attitude she
had taken up she was extremely loath to allow her son-in-law a triumph.

"Never mind, we'll say no more about it," she said, primly, "but I 'ave
my own ideas."

"I dessay," said Mr. Boxer; "but you're afraid for us to go to your old
fortune-teller. It would be too much of a show-up for 'im."

"It's no good your trying to aggravate me, John Boxer, because you can't
do it," said Mrs. Gimpson, in a voice trembling with passion.

"O' course, if people like being deceived they must be," said Mr. Boxer;
"we've all got to live, and if we'd all got our common sense fortune-
tellers couldn't. Does he tell fortunes by tea-leaves or by the colour
of your eyes?"