round the room. It seemed to fascinate him. "Have you any idea how
much my nephew pays for this flat, Mr. Wooster?"

"About two hundred dollars a month, I believe."

"What! Forty pounds a month!"

I began to see that, unless I made the thing a bit more plausible, the
scheme might turn out a frost. I could guess what the old boy was
thinking. He was trying to square all this prosperity with what he knew
of poor old Bicky. And one had to admit that it took a lot of squaring,
for dear old Bicky, though a stout fellow and absolutely unrivalled as
an imitator of bull-terriers and cats, was in many ways one of the most
pronounced fatheads that ever pulled on a suit of gent's underwear.

"I suppose it seems rummy to you," I said, "but the fact is New York
often bucks chappies up and makes them show a flash of speed that you
wouldn't have imagined them capable of. It sort of develops them.
Something in the air, don't you know. I imagine that Bicky in the past,
when you knew him, may have been something of a chump, but it's quite
different now. Devilish efficient sort of chappie, and looked on in
commercial circles as quite the nib!"

"I am amazed! What is the nature of my nephew's business, Mr. Wooster?"

"Oh, just business, don't you know. The same sort of thing Carnegie and
Rockefeller and all these coves do, you know." I slid for the door.
"Awfully sorry to leave you, but I've got to meet some of the lads
elsewhere."