"You silly ass! Not so hard!"

Where had I heard that stentorian but childish voice before? Who was this road-breaker's acolyte, with his brazier, his dirty face, and--a public-school accent?

I leaned over the balustrade and surveyed him and his two companions.

Then I drew my breath sharply.

Merciful heavens!

The dirty-faced boy was my brother-in-law, Master Gerald Rubislaw, the clip-administerer was Dicky Lever, and the gigantic and taciturn navvy was--my Secretary!

Having witnessed the carrying-out of the sentence, the policeman returned to his duties; none too soon; for a furniture van and a butcher's cart, locked in an inextricable embrace, the subject of a sulphurous duet between their respective proprietors, called loudly for his attention.

Meanwhile Coaldust, who had been inspecting the result of our friends'

united labours with some interest, suddenly echoed the question which had first exercised Champion's logical mind by inquiring what the blank dash the two adjectival criminals and the qualified nipper thought they were doing to the asterisked road.

He received no encouragement. Robin was now engaged with a hammer and chisel in cutting a sort of touch-line all round the encampment, while Dicky did not cease manfully to delve with the pick-axe in the pit which he had digged for himself. For a long time they turned a deaf ear to the anxious inquiries of their interlocutor.

But there are limits to long-suffering. Coaldust's witticisms increased with his audience, and at last Dicky turned to Robin and cried, with a really admirable maintenance of character and accent--

"'Ere, Scotty, come and give this bloke one in the neck. 'E's askin' for it!"

Robin deliberately suspended operations, rose heavily to his feet, and cleared his throat. Then he turned upon the alcoholic Coaldust. I strained my ears. Surely _he_ was not going to talk Cockney!

Far from it. He stuck to his last.

"See here, ma man," he roared, in a voice that made the crowd jump, "are ye for a ding on the side o' the heid?"

Coaldust capitulated with alacrity.

"No offence, 'Orace!" he remarked genially. "You an' me was always pals.

Put it there!" He extended an ebony hand, which Robin solemnly shook and returned to his work.

Whatever my three friends were up to, it is possible that they might now have been left in peace for some time; for the crowd, seeing no chance of further sport from Coaldust, began to melt away. But a fresh character entered the scene to keep alive the nagging interest of the drama.

My first intimation that something new was afoot came from an errand-boy on the edge of the crowd, who, addressing a lady or ladies unseen, suddenly expressed a desire to be chased.

All heads were now turned down the street, and there, approaching with rather faltering steps, carrying a red cotton bundle and a tea-can, I beheld--one of my sisters-in-law!

Postulating Dicky, I presumed it was Dilly, and I began to piece together in my mind the plot of this elaborate comedy. Evidently Dicky, Robin, and Gerald had decided--for a bet, or because they were dared, or possibly with a view to giving Champion's Bill a leg-up by a practical demonstration of the crying need for it--to dress themselves up as workmen and come and "do a turn," as they say in the music halls, to the discomfort of his Majesty's lieges and the congestion of traffic, upon some sufficiently busy thoroughfare for a stated period of time.

Certainly they were doing it rather well. They were admirably made up,--Dicky was a past-master at that sort of thing,--and their operations so far had been sufficiently like the genuine article to impose upon the public in general,--if we except Champion and Coaldust,--even to the point of securing the assistance of the traffic-directing policeman.

But alas! with that one step further, which is so often fatal to great enterprises, they had sought to add a finishing touch of realism to their impersonation by the inclusion of a little feminine interest; and to that end Dilly had been added to the cast--or more likely had added herself--in the _role_ of a young person of humble station bringing her affianced his tea.

And, not for the first time in the history of man, it was the woman who opened the door to disaster.

Dilly wore a natty print dress--probably my housemaid's--with a tartan shawl over her head. She had on her thickest shoes, but they were woefully smart and thin for a girl of her class. Moreover, her hair was beautifully arranged under the shawl, and her hands--though she had had the sense to discard her ruby and sapphire engagement-ring--were too white and her face was too clean to lend conviction to her impersonation. In short, in her desire to present a pleasing _tout ensemble_--an object in which I must say she had succeeded to perfection--Dilly had utterly neglected detail and histrionic accuracy.

Evidently she was not expecting a gallery. Two highly-interested concentric circles--one of people and one of dogs--round her _fiance's_ encampment was rather more than she had bargained for. She had emerged quite suddenly from a side street (which I knew led to a shortcut from home) and now paused irresolutely a few yards away, crimson to the roots of her hair, what time the errand-boy, with looks of undisguised admiration, continued to reiterate his desire to be pursued.

The crowd all turned and stared at poor Dilly. Obviously they did not know what to make of her. Possibly she was some one from the chorus of a musical comedy going to be photographed, possibly she was merely "a bit balmy," or possibly she was an advertisement for something, and would begin to distribute hand-bills presently. So far, she merely looked as if she wanted to cry.

It was Robin who saw her first. He immediately stepped over his newly-completed touch-line, and taking the spotted bundle and the tea-can from her hands, conducted her ceremoniously within the magic circle, saying, in a voice much more like his own than before--

"Come away, lassie!"

Dicky looked up from his labours at this, and beheld his _fiancee_ for the first time. All he said was--

"By gad, you've done it after all! Bravo!"

But Dilly did not appear to be at all gratified She merely sat on Gerald's little mountain of paving-blocks, looking as if she could not decide whether to throw her apron over her face and scream, or take a header into the wigwam. My heart bled for her in spite of her folly. The crowd, deeply interested and breathing hard, stood round waiting for the performance to begin.

It was Coaldust who took the lead.

"Tip us a song and dance, Clara," he said encouragingly.

Robin, who had been making a show of unfastening the bundle, suddenly rose to his feet. Coaldust saw him.

"All right, Carnegie," he remarked hurriedly. "No offence, ole pal!"

But Robin turned to Dicky, and the two held a hasty conversation, whose nature I could guess. Dilly could not be exposed to this sort of thing any longer. They began to put on their coats.

"They are going to give it up," I said, not without relief. "About time, isn't it? Do you recognise them, Champion?"

But Champion, I found, was gone--probably to establish an _alibi_.

Perhaps he was right. Questions might be asked in the House about this.

When I turned again to the scene below I found that the crowd had thickened considerably, and that the policeman had once more left the traffic to congest itself, and joined in the game.

"You must tell that young woman to move on," he said to Dicky, not unkindly. "She's causin' a crowd to collect, and that's a thing she can be give in charge for."

"All right," said Dicky hurriedly, "we're all going."

The policeman, struck by this sudden anxiety to oblige, became suspicious.

"All of you?" he said. "'Ow about this mess in the road?"

Robin came to the rescue.

"We'll be back presently and sort it," he said reassuringly.

"Of course," said Dicky, pulling himself together. "Back in 'arf a tick, governor!"

"Don't you go callin' me names," said the policeman, as the spectators indulged in happy laughter.

"Sorry!--I mean, certainly!" said Dicky, getting flustered. (I could see Robin glowering at him.) "We are just going down the street a minute.

This--er--girl has brought us a bit of bad news. There's been an accident happened--er----"

"To her puir old mither," put in Robin, whom I began to suspect of rather enjoying this entertainment for its own sake.