Page:Herbert Jenkins - Bindle.djvu/88

 "Yer 'usband, mum," Bindle suggested diplomatically.

"I haven't got one," she stuttered. "Oh! it's dreadful. He—he's in my bed, and he's bald, and he's got black whiskers."

Bindle whistled. "'Ow long's 'e been there, miss?" he enquired.

"I went to the bath-room and—and he was there when I got back. It's horrible, dreadful," and two tears that had hung pendulously in the corner of her eyes decided to made the plunge, and ploughed their way through the make-up, leaving brown trails like devastating armies.

"Oh, what shall I do?"

"Well, since you arst me, miss, I shouldn't say anythink about it," replied Bindle.

"Nothing about it, nothing about a man being in my bed?" She was on the verge of hysterics. "What do you mean?"

"Well, miss, 'otels is funny places. They might put 'im on the bill as a extra."

"You—you"

What it was that Bindle most resembled he did not wait to hear, but with great tact stepped out into the corridor, closing the door behind him.

"Some'ow I thought things would 'appen," he murmured joyously.

A few yards from him he saw the form of a fair-haired youth, immaculately garbed in a brilliantly hued silk kimono, with red Turkish