Page:Leon Wilson - Ruggles of Red Gap.djvu/345

Rh "To the Central Market," responded the lady in bell-like tones, "then to the Red Front store, and to that dear little Japanese shop, if he doesn't mind."

"Mind! Mind! Course not, course not! Are you warm? Let me fasten the robe."

I confess to have felt a horrid fascination for this moment as I was able to reconstruct it from Belknap-Jackson's impassioned words. It was by way of being one of those scenes we properly loathe yet morbidly cannot resist overlooking if opportunity offers.

Into the flood tide of our Saturday shopping throng swept the car and its remarkably assembled occupants. The street fair gasped. The woman's former parade of the Honourable George had been as nothing to this exposure.

"Poor Jackson's face was a study," declared the Mixer to me later.

I dare say. It was still a study when my own turn came to observe it. The car halted before the shops that had been designated. The Klondike person dispatched her commissions in a superbly leisured manner, attentively accompanied by the Earl of Brinstead bearing packages for her.

Belknap-Jackson, at the wheel, stared straight ahead. I am told he bore himself with dignity even when some of our more ingenuous citizens paused to converse with him concerning his new motor-car. He is even said to have managed a smile when his passengers returned.

"I have it," exclaimed his lordship now. "Deuced good plan—go to that Ruggles place for a jolly fat tea. No end of a spree, what, what!"

It is said that on three occasions in turning his car and traversing the short block to the Grill the owner escaped