round, from a comestible into a missile. Simultaneously inspiration came to Archi

bald.

"Now, my dear young people," he announced, leaning back in his chair and fitting the tips of his fingers together after the traditional manner of stage clerics, "with regard to the-ah-pleasant ceremony which is to take place this afternoon, I have already explained to you that certain formalities will be necessary-connected with a special license, and Doctor's Commons, and the Archbishop of Canterbury, and so on. Mere matters of form; but you know what red tape is! John!"

James, a little uneasy at being directly addressed, came to attention.

"Bring me the telegraph-forms from my desk, please," said Archibald.

"I purpose to telegraph to his Grace for the necessary permission," he explained as James departed. "As I say, it is a purely mechanical business; I need not even give your names. Thank you, JaJohn. Put on your hat, like a good fellow, and be ready to take this telegram to the village. Let me see: Cantuar, London, is sufficient address, I think. Now for the message.' He scribbled a sentence, and handed the form to his dazed friend. "Can you read it, John?" James glanced through the message. It said:

"Tell village policeman that man who ran over ducklings is here."

"Is that clear, John?" asked Archibald. James uttered a muffled sound, and departed.

"A strange, reticent fellow," explained Archibald to his guests; "but a heart of gold, and suffers terribly with his tonsils. Shall we go into the garden? The birds are singing. Lovely, is it not?"

He cooed, and rose to his feet. "The answer to the telegram," he said, "should be here within the hour, leaving ample margin for the ceremony. I also expect a clerical friend about that time. Doubtless he will be glad to assist me, and so make assurance doubly sure."

He led the way into the garden, comporting himself meanwhile in a manner suggestive sometimes of the Rev. Robert Spalding, sometimes of Mr. Fairchild, sometimes of a sprightly and well-nourished lamb. He was still in a condition of utter

ignorance as to how this escapade was to end; but he intended, if all else failed, to heap the solution of the problem upon the unsuspecting shoulders of the Old Flick. Meanwhile, he calculated, the village policeman would add an artistic element of complication to the day's entertainment.

Suddenly, as he strolled with his guests down an aisle of high hollyhocks, he heard a crunching sound upon the gravel. Across the hollyhocks he perceived a small governess-cart, drawn by a fat, gray pony, grinding its way round the corner of the house in the direction of the stable. The driver of the cart had his back turned, but Archibald could see that he wore a soft, black clerical hat.

The Old Flick! The deus in machina! "I rather fancy that is my dear friend Windrum," he said. "Permit me to leave you for a moment. You have doubtless much to discuss." He smiled archly. "The raspberries are at your disposal."

With a pontifical gesture of farewell Archibald turned and stalked majestically in the direction of the house. This would be a surprise for the Old Flick!

He entered the house softly. Before him in the hall stood the tall, black-coated figure of the gentleman to whom he was acting as understudy. His back was turned, and he was gazing dumbly through the dining-room door at the debris of the recent feast.

His attention was distracted from the spectacle by a shattering blow in the spine, followed by a thunderous greeting in a hearty voice.

He whirled round. He was not the Old Flick at all.

"Good afternoon," said Archibald, with a seraphic smile. "I consider it very kind of you to have called. Come into the study, won't you?"

The stranger, a severe-looking man of about fifty, wearing spectacles over which his beetling brows bent threateningly, followed the hospitable Archibald into the study, and shut the door with great deliberation.

"My name," he said, "is Septimus Pontifex."

"I am very glad to make your acquaintance, Pontifex," said Archibald, cordially. And reaching down a box from the mantelpiece, he offered Septimus one of his own cigarettes.

"May I inquire," said Mr. Pontifex in a low, vibrating voice, "what you are doing in my house?"

"Your house? Come, I like that!" replied Archibald, with an indulgent smile.

"You are pleased to be facetious, sir," retorted Mr. Pontifex, angrily. His spinal chord was still quivering from Archibald's playful slap. "If this house is not my actual property, it is mine in effect so long as I remain Mr. Windrum's locum-tenens."

So that was it! Archibald surveyed the swelling figure before him thoughtfully. He had better explain at once. No; on second thought he would wait a little. This was evidently a quarrelsome and inhospitable fellow, very different from the Flick, unworthy of great consideration. What would be a good way

He was recalled from his meditations by the alarming demeanor of Mr. Pontifex. For the last half-minute his gaze had been concentrated upon a small, crimson, circular object upon the right-hand leg of Archibald's trousers. It was a spot of sealing-wax. Now he pointed a trembling finger, and almost screamed:

"What do you mean, sir, by wearing my clothes? I recognize my trousers; do not deny it! I spilt that sealing-wax last night. I know they are mine."

"Really, Pontifex, really!" expostulated Archibald, gently. "I had heard stories, of course, but I had no idea it was as bad as this. No wonder the dear bishop was getting anxious! My poor friend, can't you do anything-anything? heart bleeds for you."

He shook his head mournfully.

My

For a moment Pontifex gazed at him in speechless amazement, and then turned and walked swiftly out of the room and up-stairs. Presently he could be heard. overhead, seeking confirmatory evidence in his rifled dressing-room.

Archibald lit a cigarette and waited. Presently Septimus Pontifex came striding down-stairs again. He stood in the doorway.

"You are a thief, sir," he announced, "and an impostor. I do not know who you are or where you come from, but I presume that the motor-bicycle which I noticed in the stable is yours. I shall now lock you in here, and send for a constable."

"Do not put yourself to such trouble,

my dear Mr. Pontifex," replied Archibald. "I have already done so."

He led the bemused Pontifex to the window.

"In fact," he added, "I think I see him coming."

DOROTHY was still enough of a child to appreciate being let loose among the raspberry-canes. But this afternoon her appetite was gone, which was not altogether surprising. Eloping is like riding a bicycle: you must go full speed ahead all the time, or you will begin to wobble. Dorothy was of a romantic disposition and barely twenty. She had been attracted by Mr. Gillibrand's dark eyes and lofty soul, and the fact that a peppery papa and a Philistine elder brother had described her Galahad as an effeminate young puppy and a mangy little swine respectively had been quite sufficient to persuade her that she loved him to distraction. But, as already indicated, you cannot take an elopement andante. Dorothy was wobbling badly. The sunny, peaceful garden did not soothe her at all. She wanted to cry.

Furtively, almost fearfully, she peeped through the surrounding foliage in search of her beloved. He was wandering—one had almost said slouching-among the rose-beds. Suddenly he raised his head. and gave a startled glance in the direction of the house. Then he ducked, and running with incredible swiftness in the attitude of a red Indian on a war-trail, dived into a rhododendron-bush and disappeared from sight.

Dorothy was too astounded to move or even cry out. Then she heard the thump of elephantine feet moving deliberately over the grass, and the next moment there appeared before her a policeman, the largest policeman she had ever seen.

Now, although we are pleased to be humorous upon the subject of policemen in music-hall songs and the like, it is in a spirit of pure bravado. Secretly we are all afraid of policemen; our upbringing at the hands of unscrupulous under-nurses has insured that. Whether we are stealing jam or engaging in an elopement, the policeman is ever in our thoughts. Dorothy trembled guiltily.

The policeman addressed her. He was a stout, jolly-looking man, and in his leisure moments was much in request as a

minder of the baby. He was painfully aware of this infirmity, and in the execution of his duty endeavored to nullify it by assuming an air of intense importance and solemnity. He spoke in a deep monotone, and his language was formal and official.

"Afternoon, miss. I am informed that the gentleman what passed through Popleigh village about twelve-thirty P.M. today, riding a motor-cycle with side-car attached, is on these premises. Can you give me information as to his whereabouts?"

"He is somewhere about the garden, I think," gasped Dorothy.

cn.

The policeman thanked her, and passed

Dorothy watched him out of sight, and then turned and ran blindly. Leo was in deadly danger. Where was her kindly host? He must be informed at once. Perhaps he would be able to confound the policeman with a telegram from the Archbishop of Canterbury.

She fluttered breathlessly round the corner of a hedge, and ran straight into the arms of Mr. James Pryor. He no longer wore spectacles or bandages.

Dorothy started back, with a hysterical little cry.

"Jim!" she whispered. "You?"

"Yes," said Jim, simply, "just me." Dorothy gave him both her hands. "Jim dear," she said, "I 'm in trouble. I'm frightened."

James looked round, and espied an adjacent summer-house.

"Step into the consulting-room," he said.

THE Rev. Septimus Pontifex, too bewildered to speak, walked giddily across the grass. Archibald accompanied him. Ten yards behind, cautiously came an elderly female carrying three dead ducklings.

The policeman had just extracted Lionel Gillibrand from the rhododendronbush, and having produced a note-book and pencil from the interior of his tunic, was embarking upon a searching, but stereotyped, inquiry into his prisoner's identity and antecedents.

"Your name and address?" he repeated. "You have no right to ask me," persisted Lionel, uneasily. "The law cannot touch me in this matter."

"Your name and address?" reiterated the policeman, with the steady insistency of a man who has the whole British Constitution at his back.

"You had better give it, Mr. Gillibrand," advised the apoplectic clergyman. Lionel complied sulkily.

"I say again," he added, "that the law cannot touch me in the matter. There was no compulsion or undue influence. It was a purely voluntary act."

The policeman, determined not to be obfuscated by irrelevant verbiage, plowed

on.

"I must ask you to show me your license," he said.

In a flash Lionel's courage came back. "Certainly," he replied triumphantly. "I have a special license."

The policeman scratched his ear in a puzzled fashion, and then resorted to sar

casm.

"Special?" he said slowly. "What may a special license be? Does it include liddle ducklin's?"

It was Mr. Gillibrand's turn to be puzzled.

"Ducklings?" he repeated, then added with sudden fury, "Are you referring to my future-"

"I'm referrin'," said the policeman, doggedly, "to your license."

"I tell you I have a special license," shouted Lionel-"coming from the Archbishop of Canterbury." bishop of Canterbury." He turned to Archibald. "Have you got the telegram yet, sir?" he inquired feverishly.

"Not yet," replied Archibald.

"Touchin' this license," persisted the unimpressed policeman, "I don't see what the Archbishop of Canterbury has got to do with liddle ducklin's. But, Mrs. Challice, will you step this way?"

The elderly female with the corpses, who had been standing respectfully aloof, glided mechanically forward.

"I was a-sittin' outside of my door, sir-" she began rapidly to Archibald.

"You will be charged-" announced the policeman to Mr. Gillibrand.

"Hallo, what 's that?" exclaimed Archibald.

From the drive before the front door came a whirring and a popping. "It's my motor-cycle!" screamed Lionel.

"B.F., seven-oh-two," corroborated the

policeman, grimly. "I 've got your number. Here, stop!"

Gillibrand tore across the grass in the direction of the drive, with the policeman hard upon his heels, followed, longo intervallo, by the owner of the ducklings. He arrived in time to see his motor-cycle, carrying two passengers, swing out of the vicarage gate to the road, and speed away, with one derisive toot, in the direction of Tuckleford and home.

Still he ran

THE two clerical gentlemen were left face to face. Mr. Pontifex cleared his throat and began at once.

"Sir," he said, "I insist upon an immediate explanation. You have broken into my house, you are masquerading in my clothes, you have apparently entertained a party of friends to luncheon in my dining-room-you have now involved me in a grotesque and inexplicable brawl between a village policeman and an escaped criminal, to whom you have apparently promised a dispensation from the Archbishop of Canterbury. If you can explain all these circumstances, I shall be extremely grateful to you."

Archibald laid a sudden hand on Mr. Pontifex's shoulder, and smiled upon him frankly and disarmingly.

"Sir," he said, "you are right. I owe you both explanation and apology. My name is Archibald Wade, and I have the reputation among my friends of being an irresponsible lunatic. If you wish for corroboration on this point, I refer you to our common friend Windrum, whose duties you appear to have undertaken for the moment."

"For a month, to be precise. He is away on holiday."

Thereupon Archibald told the whole

story. He was a born raconteur, be it said. Long before he had finished, the severity of Mr. Pontifex's expression relaxed; his austere features twitched; his eyes began to twinkle behind his spectacles; and ultimately he was constrained to sit down upon a rustic bench and have his laugh out.

He was still laughing when the policeman returned, leading Lionel captive.

"I've got him, gentlemen," panted the policeman. Then, severely, to his prisoner: "Trying to escape amounts to resisting of the police in the execution of their duty. That makes things more serious." Out came the note-book once more. "You will now be charged with driving through Popleigh village to the common danger, exceeding the speed limit, running over three liddle ducklin's, refusing to stop when requested to do so by a police officer, and resisting of the police by trying to run away."

"Do you mean to say," Gillibrand inquired slowly, "that that is all?" "Enough, too," rejoined the policeman. "But I thought you-"

Here Archibald intervened swiftly. "Yes," he said, regarding Mr. Lionel Gillibrand steadily between the eyes, "that is all. If you have anything else on your conscience-well, forget it! See?" Gillibrand was a poltroon, but he was no fool. He took the hint.

HE burly gave sergeant of sappers

ΤΗ

the propeller a few violent twists, and jumped quickly on one side. The propeller revolved with a weird flapping that turned to a quick, loud hum and then to a buzz as of a myriad hornets. A little bugler ran alongside for a few yards; then the biplane rose.

From the firing-line a mile and a half ahead the rifles sounded like the ripping of a gigantic piece of silk. Orderlies' horses drummed the ground on their way to and from the commander-in-chief's headquarters. The report of the nine-inch gun burst like claps of thunder. As the biplane passed, a squad of artillerymen looked up and cheered. From one hundred yards below their cheer resembled the thin shouting of boys.

Stanton looked at his pilot huddled over the steering-wheel. In his thick woolen hood he had the appearance of an immense gray rat. The aëroplane went up steadily like a mounting bird.

They were to reconnoiter the enemy whose position they were attacking, and report by wireless. They were to make a general reconnaissance of the firing-line and of the reserves, and to find out where the definitely intrenched works lay.

It was Stanton's first aëroplane reconnaissance in combat, and he felt confident. He had examined his machine and wireless equipment thoroughly before starting. His pilot was one of the best fliers of the

cart over a stony road. They were flying easily. Little puffs of wind struck them from time to time with playful buffets. There was an undulation from right.

The machine again began to mount steadily, and the pilot swung to the right. He throttled the motor and volplaned in a long gliding swoop. Then Stanton looked downward.

There was an immensity of green in wide, rolling billows and in little hills and hummocks. Here and there it swirled into a clump of trees or a group of houses. A village stood in the distance like the center of a whirlpool.

As they came nearer, Stanton could distinguish the batteries and guns and massed reserves, and then he saw the firing-line like a piece of loosely laid rope stretching ten miles. He saw the redoubts and batteries breaking it up into a grotesque pattern that a child might have conceived at play. Over it all there hung a faint bluish haze.

He got out his binoculars and swept the position. Along the flanks he could see dark blotches that were dismounted cavalry, and far in the rear the lines of ammunition and supply and hospital wagons massed like a little city. Between the flanks and the firing-line there were dark splashes that were reserves, and there were the huge nine-inch guns, and little black dots running to and fro in circles. It looked like jumbled pieces in an immense puzzle.

The biplane was rushing forward. The landscape flashed by underneath in a hazy blur. They wanted to get a general view of the field before reconnoitering in detail.