Page:The Intrusion of Jimmy.djvu/94

80 "I don't even know her name."

"But dash it all, I say, I mean! Have you ever spoken to her?"

"Only once. It's rather a complicated story. At any rate, she's gone."

Lord Dreever said that it was a rum business. Jimmy conceded the point.

"Seems to me," said his lordship, "we're both in the cart."

"What's your trouble?"

Lord Dreever hesitated.

"Oh, well, it's only that I want to marry one girl, and my uncle's dead set on my marrying another."

"Are you afraid of hurting your uncle's feelings?"

"It's not so much hurting his feelings. It's—oh, well, it's too long to tell now. I think I'll be getting home. I'm staying at our place in Eaton Square."

"How are you going? If you'll walk, I'll come some of the way with you."

"Right you are. Let's be pushing along, shall we?"

They turned up into the Strand, and through Trafalgar Square into Piccadilly. Piccadilly has a restful aspect in the small hours. Some men were cleaning the road with water from a long hose. The swishing of the torrent on the parched wood was musical.

Just beyond the gate of Hyde Park, to the right of the road, stands a cabmen's shelter. Conversation