intention of reassurance. "I can do it right enough,
so far as the big things are concerned. It'll be in the
little things that I'll want some steering."

"I've already told you--you may command me to the utmost
of my power," the other declared. Upon reflection,
he was disposed to be ashamed of himself. His nerves
and facial muscles had been guilty of an unpardonable
lapse into snobbishness--and toward a man, too, who had
been capable of behaviour more distinguished in its
courtesy and generosity than any he had encountered
in all the "upper circles" put together. He recalled all
at once, moreover, that Thorpe's "h's" were perfect--aud,
for some occult reason, this completed his confusion.

"My dear fellow"--he began again, confronting with verbal
awkwardness the other's quizzical smile--"don't think I
doubt anything about you. I know well enough that you
can do anything--be anything--you like."

Thorpe laughed softly.

"I don't think you know, though, that I'm a public-
school man," he said.

Plowden lifted his brows in unfeigned surprise.
"No--I didn't know that," he admitted, frankly.

"Yes, I'm a Paul's Pigeon," Thorpe went on, "as they
called them in my day. That's gone out now, I'm told,