When a penniless but oh, so ladylike "companion" goes to the Savoy in answer to a "with a view to matrimony" advertisement, what more natural than that the party of the first part should prove to benot a genteel widower in the haberdashery business, but a handsome super-burglar of immense wealth and all the more refined virtues.

With spring sunshine even hot against the steel rails of Winchester Road, and awnings drawn against its inroads into the window display, Mrs. Shila Coblenz, routing gloom, reached up tiptoe across the haberdashery counter for the suspended chain of a cluster of bulbs, the red of exertion rising up the taut line of throat and lifted chin.