"There's a lot about us," he said. "Do you mind if I light up?"

"Why should I mind?" asked MacIan.

Turnbull eyed with a certain studious interest, the man who did
not understand any of the verbal courtesies; he lit his pipe and
blew great clouds out of it.

"Yes," he resumed. "The matter on which you and I are engaged is
at this moment really the best copy in England. I am a
journalist, and I know. For the first time, perhaps, for many
generations, the English are really more angry about a wrong
thing done in England than they are about a wrong thing done in
France."

"It is not a wrong thing," said MacIan.

Turnbull laughed. "You seem unable to understand the ordinary use
of the human language. If I did not suspect that you were a
genius, I should certainly know you were a blockhead. I fancy we
had better be getting along and collecting our baggage."

And he jumped up and began shoving the luggage into his pockets,
or strapping it on to his back. As he thrust a tin of canned
meat, anyhow, into his bursting side pocket, he said casually:

"I only meant that you and I are the most prominent people in the
English papers."

"Well, what did you expect?" asked MacIan, opening his great