"
"Not! Why they told me you were Captain Spy of the _Sporting
Life_--in disguise."
It would have been difficult for a joke to fall more flat. Nobody
laughed, though why Mr. Augustus Longcord could not understand, and
maybe none of his audience could have told him, for at Forty-eight
Bloomsbury Square Mr. Augustus Longcord passed as a humorist. The
stranger himself appeared unaware that he was being made fun of.
"You have been misinformed," assured him the stranger.
"I beg your pardon," said Mr. Augustus Longcord.
"It is nothing," replied the stranger in his sweet low voice, and
passed on.
"Well what about this theatre," demanded Mr. Longcord of his friend
and partner; "do you want to go or don't you?" Mr. Longcord was
feeling irritable.
"Goth the ticketh--may ath well," thought Isidore.
"Damn stupid piece, I'm told."
"Motht of them thupid, more or leth. Pity to wathte the ticketh,"
argued Isidore, and the pair went out.
"Are you staying long in London?" asked Miss Kite, raising her
practised eyes towards the stranger.
"Not long," answered the stranger. "At least I do not know. It
depends."
An unusual quiet had invaded the drawing-room of Forty-eight
Bloomsbury Square, generally noisy with strident voices about this
hour. The Colonel remained engrossed in his paper.
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