"Fortunate that I reminded you," says John, the smile round his lips
deepening.

Will fidgets on his seat. "I'm afraid, my dear Jack," he says, "I
shall have to get you to renew it, just for a month or two,--deuced
awkward thing, but I'm remarkably short of money this year. Truth
is, I can't get what's owing to myself."

"That's very awkward, certainly," replies his friend, "because I am
not at all sure that I shall be able to renew it."

Will stares at him in some alarm. "But what am I to do if I hav'n't
the money?"

John Ingerfield shrugs his shoulders.

"You don't mean, my dear Jack, that you would put me in prison?"

"Why not? Other people have to go there who can't pay their debts."

Will Cathcart's alarm grows to serious proportions. "But our
friendship," he cries, "our--"

"My dear Will," interrupts the other, "there are few friends I would
lend three hundred pounds to and make no effort to get it back. You,
certainly, are not one of them."

"Let us make a bargain," he continues. "Find me a wife, and on the
day of my marriage I will send you back that bill with, perhaps, a
couple of hundred added. If by the end of next month you have not