“The renewal has already been applied for and granted. Leon found at Heavytree Farm some blank sheets of note-paper signed with the girl’s name. He stole one during the aunt’s absence and filled up the blank with a formal request for renewal. I have just had a wire to say that the lease is extended.”
He and Poiccart had to walk the best part of the way to New Cross before they could find a taxicab. Leon had gone on with the girl. Poiccart was worried about something, and did not speak his mind until the providential cab appeared on the scene and they were trundling along the New Cross Road.
“My dear George, I am a little troubled about Leon,” he said at last. “It seems almost impossible to believe, but——”
“But what?” asked Manfred good-humouredly, and knowing what was coming.
“You don’t believe,” said Poiccart in a hushed voice, as though he were discussing the advent of some world cataclysm—“you don’t believe that Leon is in love, do you?”
Manfred considered for a moment.
“Such things happen, even to just men,” he said, and Poiccart shook his head sadly.
“I have never contemplated such an unhappy contingency,” he said, and Manfred was laughing to himself all the way back to town.
THE END
Printed in Great Britain by Butler & Tanner Ltd., Frome and London