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324 324 A DOUBLE-BARRELLED GHOST.

annuals that appear at Christmas. The real season at which we are active on earth is summer, as every journalist knows. By Christmas the authors of our being have completely for- gotten our existence. As a writer myself, and calling in connection with a literary matter, I thought it more profes- sional to pay my visit during the dog days, especially as your being in trouble supplied me with an excuse for asking permission to go beyond bounds."

" You knew I was in trouble ? " I murmured, touched by this sympathy from an unexpected quarter.

" Certainly. And from a selfish point of view I am not sorry. You have always been so inconsiderately happy that I could never find a seemly pretext to get out to see you."

" Is it only when your descendants are in trouble that you are allowed to visit them?" I enquired.

" Even so," he answered. " Of course spirits whose births were tragic, who were murdered into existence, are allowed to supplement the inefficient police departments of the upper globe, and a similar charter is usually extended to those who have hidden treasures on their conscience ; but it is obvious that if all spirits were accorded what furloughs they pleased, eschatology would become a farce. Sir, you have no idea of the number of bogus criminal romances ten- dered daily by those wishing to enjoy the roving license of avenging spirits, for the ex-assassinated are the most enviable of immortals, and cases of personation are of frequent occur- rence. Our actresses, too, are always pretending to have lost jewels ; there is no end to the excuses. The Christmas Bank Holiday is naturally inadequate to our needs. Sir, I should have been far happier if my descendants had gone wrong ; but in spite of the large fortune I had accumulated, both your father and your grandfather were of exemplary respectability and unruffled cheerfulness. The solitary