Page:The principal girl (IA principalgirl00snai).pdf/35

 barony, as he gazed in at the window. "Always was a muddlin' fool—but you can't go back on your word with kids, can you? Now I must be careful which sort I choose. I expect that sort in pink boxes will make 'em as sick as Monday mornin'."

In this opinion, however, B. Venoist did not concur. He assured the heir to the barony that it was exactly the same quality as that supplied to Buckingham Palace, The Durdans, High Cliff Castle and Eaton Hall.

"If that is so," said the heir to the barony, "I think I'll risk a box." "Looks pretty poisonous," he added—although not to B. Venoist.

"You'll find that all right, sir," said B. Venoist. "Precisely the same quality as supplied to York Cottage."

"I'm glad o' that," said the heir to the barony, disbursing a sum in gold and dangling a large but neat white paper parcel from his index finger.

"Cross as two sticks," mused the stricken young man, putting forth from the chocolate shop of B. Venoist, and bestowing a nod in passing upon a choice light blue striped necktie.

By some odd association of ideas this article of attire was responsible for his course being stayed before his favorite shop window a little farther along the street: to wit, of Mr. Thomas Ling, whose neckties in the opinion of some are as nice as any in London.