tone, but laughing to himself because the celebrated young statesman,
Mr. Carrel Quire (bald at thirty-five) was precisely one of the
ministers who, during the war, had defied and trampled upon the
Treasury. He now almost demoniacally contemplated the ruin of Mr. Carrel
Quire.

"You have made a serious mistake in coming to me. Unfortunately you
cannot undo it. Be good enough to understand that you have not been
talking confidentially."

Miss Winstock ought to have been intimidated and paralysed by the
menacing manner of the former Terror of the Departments. But she was
not.

"Please, please, Mr. Prohack," she said calmly, "don't talk in that
strain. I distinctly told you I was talking confidentially, and I'm sure
I can rely on you--unless all that I've heard about you is untrue; which
it can't be. I only want matters to be settled quietly, and when Mr.
Quire returns he will pay anything that has to be paid--if it isn't too
much."

"My chauffeur asserts that you have told a most naughty untruth about
the accident. You say that he ran into you, whereas the fact is that he
was nearly standing still while you were going too fast and you skidded
badly into him off the tramlines. And he's found witnesses to prove what
he says."

"I may have been a little mistaken," Miss Winstock admitted with light
sadness. "I won't say I wasn't. You know how you are in an accident."