friend of, and so waited anxiously for the young man's return. Meanwhile he gambled with Madame Alpenny; made himself agreeable to the ex-school-mistress, whom he found a frightful bore; and went several times to the Bijou Music-hall to see Mademoiselle Zara dance. To his surprise he found that she was really a very brilliant artist, who was entirely thrown away on a Bethnal Green audience, and asked himself quite seriously if it would not be worth while to marry her and secure for her an engagement at the West End. If she made a success there--as he was sure she would do--then she could support him in luxury and the old woman could be got rid of somehow. Oh, Spruce found many ideas in The Home of the Muses which might result in the gain of money, although he saw plainly that to bring the same to fruition time was necessary. At all events, he was making a living out of Madame Alpenny; foresaw possibilities in Zara's dancing with the chance of profit to himself, and always kept in his scheming little mind that Hench might prove to be a valuable acquaintance. Therefore, the six days prior to the young man's return proved to be amusing and profitable and promising. As Spruce had become an adventurer and a picker-up of unconsidered trifles, after the fashion of Autolycus, he was quite content with the progress he had made so far in his new camping-ground. For that it was, since Spruce had no idea of having a home, and disliked domesticity.     

       It was on Sunday afternoon that Hench returned. Madame Alpenny was lying down for a rest, as she always did on the seventh day; Zara had slipped out for a walk with Bracken; and Mrs. Tesk was laboriously reading a religious book, which she found extremely dull, but considered the correct thing to peruse on the Sabbath. Spruce being left very much to his own devices, had amused himself by sorting his wardrobe, and towards five       o'clock was beginning to find time hang heavy on his hands. With a yawn he descended to the smoking-room to idle away an hour with a cigarette and the Sunday papers. In the bleak little apartment devoted to the goddess Nicotine--a goddess unknown to the Olympians, it may be remarked--he came suddenly upon a tall young man who was puffing his pipe and listlessly staring out of the window. Rather from intuition than from positive knowledge, the Nut guessed that this was the returned wanderer.     

       "Hullo, Hench, and how are you?" was his greeting, and he advanced with a gracious smile and an 

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