Hillport. ('_Good old Jos!_') That's not all. The Mayor insisted on
putting his own ten pounds to mine and making it twenty. Here are the
two identical notes, his and mine.' Mr. Gordon waved the identical notes
amid an uproar. 'We've decided that everyone who has dined here to-night
shall receive a brand-new shilling. I see Mr. Septimus Lovatt from the
bank there with a bag. He will attend to you as you go out. (_Wild
outbreak and tumult of rapturous applause_.) And now three cheers for
your Mayor--and Mayoress!'

It was colossal, the enthusiasm.

'_And_ for Gas Gordon!' called several voices.

The cheers rose again in surging waves.

Everyone remarked that the Mayor, usually so imperturbable, was quite
overcome--seemed as if he didn't know where to look.

Afterwards, as the occupants of the platform descended, Mr. Gordon
glanced into the eyes of Mrs. Curtenty, and found there his exceeding
reward. The mediocrity had blossomed out that evening into something new
and strange. Liar, deliberate liar and self-accused gambler as he was,
he felt that he had lived during that speech; he felt that it was the
supreme moment of his life.

'What a perfectly wonderful man your husband is!' said Mrs. Duncalf to
Mrs. Curtenty.

Clara turned to her husband with a sublime gesture of satisfaction. In
the brougham, going home, she bewitched him with wifely endearments. She