Jimmy became quite cordial.

“You have been well grounded, Spike,” he said. “And, after all, that is half the battle. The advice I give to every novice is, ‘Learn to walk before you try to run.’ Master the A B C of the craft first. With a little careful coaching you will do. Just so. Pop in.”

Spike climbed cautiously over the sill, followed by Jimmy. The latter struck a match and found the electric light switch. They were in a parlour furnished and decorated with surprising taste. Jimmy had expected the usual hideousness, but here everything, 40 from the wall-paper to the smallest ornaments, was wonderfully well selected.

40

Business, however, was business. This was no time to stand admiring artistic efforts in room-furnishing. There was that big J to be carved on the front door. If ’twere done, then ’twere well ’twere done quickly.

He was just moving to the door, when from some distant part of the house came the bark of a dog. Another joined in. The solo became a duet. The air was filled with their clamour.

“Gee!” cried Spike.

The remark seemed more or less to sum up the situation.

“’Tis sweet,” says Byron, “to hear the watch-dog’s honest bark.” Jimmy and Spike found two watch-dogs’ honest barks cloying. Spike intimated this by making a feverish dash for the open window. Unfortunately for the success of this manoeuvre, the floor of the room was covered, not with a carpet, but with tastefully scattered rugs, and underneath these rugs it was very highly polished. Spike, treading on one of these islands, was instantly undone. No power of will or muscle can save a man in such a case. Spike skidded. His feet flew from under him. There was a momentary flash of red hair, as of a passing meteor. The next moment he had fallen on his back with a thud which shook the house, and probably the rest of Manhattan Island as well. Even in that crisis the thought flashed across Jimmy’s mind that this was not Spike’s lucky night.

Upstairs the efforts of the canine choir had begun to resemble the “A che la morte” duet in Il Trovatore. Particularly good work was being done by the baritone dog.

Spike sat up, groaning. Equipped though he was by nature with a skull of the purest and most solid ivory, the fall had disconcerted him. His eyes, like those of Shakespeare’s poet, rolling a 

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