The girl looked up from the coffee-pot she was handling.
"Have you made up your mind, dear?"
"About going in with Bones?" Hamilton smiled. "No, not yet. Bones is frantically insistent, has had a beautiful new Sheraton desk placed in his office, and says that I'm the influence he wants, but----"
He shook his head.
"I think I understand," said Sanders. "You feel that he is doing it all out of sheer generosity and kindness. That would be like Bones. But isn't there a chance that what he says is true--that he does want a corrective influence?"
"Maybe that is so," said Captain Hamilton doubtfully. "And then there's the money. I don't mind investing my little lot, but it would worry me to see Bones pretending that all the losses of the firm came out of his share, and a big slice of the profits going into mine."
"I shouldn't let that worry you," said his sister quietly. "Bones is too nice-minded to do anything so crude. Of course, your money is nothing compared with Bones's fortune, but why don't you join him on the understanding that the capital of the Company should be---- How much would you put in?
"Four thousand."
"Well, make the capital eight thousand. Bones could always lend the Company money. Debentures--isn't that the word?"
Sanders smiled in her face.
"You're a remarkable lady," he said. "From where on earth did you get your ideas on finance?"
She went red.
"I lunched with Bones yesterday," she said. "And here is the post."
"Silence, babbler," said Hamilton. "Before we go any farther, what about this matter of partnership you were discussing with Patricia?"
The maid distributed the letters. One was addressed:
"Captin Captian Hamilton, D.S.O."
"From Bones," said Hamilton unnecessarily, and Bones's letter claimed first attention. It was a frantic and an ecstatic epistle, heavily underlined and exclaimed.
"Dear old old Ham," it ran, "you simply must join me in _magnifficant_ new sceme sheme plan! Wonderfull prophits profets! The most extraordiny _chance_ for a fortune..."
"For Heaven's sake, what's this?" asked Hamilton, handing the letter across to his sister and indicating an illegible line. "It looks like 'a bad girl's leg' to me."
"My dear!" said the shocked Mrs. Sanders, and studied the vile caligraphy. "It certainly does look like that," she admitted, "and---- I see! 'Legacy' is the word."
"A bad girl's legacy is the titel of the play story picture" (Bones never crossed anything out). "There's a studyo at Tunbridge and two cameras and a fellow awfully nice fellow who understands it. A pot of money the story can be improve improved imensely. Come in it dear old man--_magnifficant_ chance. See me at office eariliest earilest ealiest possible time.
"Thine in art for art sake, "BONES."
"From which I gather that Bones is taking a header into the cinema business," said Sanders. "What do you say, Hamilton?"
Hamilton thought a while.
"I'll see Bones," he said.
He arrived in Town soon after ten, but Bones had been at his office two hours earlier, for the fever of the new enterprise was upon him, and his desk was piled high with notes, memoranda, price lists and trade publications. (Bones, in his fine rage of construction, flew to the technical journals as young authors fly to the Thesaurus.)
As Hamilton entered the office, Bones glared up.
"A chair," said the young man peremptorily. "No time to be lost, dear old artist. Time is on the wing, the light is fadin', an' if we want to put this jolly old country--God bless it!--in the forefront----"
Bones put down his pen and leant back in his chair.
"Ham," he said, "I had a bit of a pow-pow with your sacred and sainted sister, bless her jolly old heart. That's where the idea arose. Are you on?"
"I'm on," said Hamilton, and there was a moving scene. Bones shook his hands and spoke broken English.
"There's your perfectly twee little desk, dear old officer," he said, pointing to a massive piece of furniture facing his own. "And there's only one matter to be settled."
He was obviously uncomfortable, and Hamilton would have reached for his cheque-book, only he knew his Bones much better than to suppose that such a sordid matter as finance could cause his agitation.
"Ham," said Bones, clearing his throat and speaking with an effort, "old comrade of a hundred gallant encounters, and dear old friend----"
"What's the game?" asked Hamilton suspiciously.
"There's no game," said the depressed Bones. "This is a very serious piece of business, my jolly old comrade. As my highly respected partner, you're entitled to use the office as you like--come in when you like, go home when you like. If you have a pain in the tum-tum, dear old friend, just go to bed and trust old Bones to carry on. Use any paper that's going, help yourself to nibs--you'll find there's some beautiful nibs in that cupboard--in fact, do as you jolly well like; but----"
"But?" repeated Hamilton.
"On one point alone, dear old thing," said Bones miserably, yet heroically, "we do not share."
"What's that?" asked Hamilton, not without curiosity.
"My typewriter is my typewriter," said Bones firmly, and Hamilton laughed.
"You silly ass!" he said. "I'm not going to play with your typewriter."
"That's just what I mean," said Bones. "You couldn't have put it better, dear old friend. Thank you."
He strode across the room, gripped Hamilton's hand and wrung it.
"Dear old thing, she's too young," he said brokenly. "Hard life ... terrible experience... Play with her young affections, dear old thing? No..."
"Who the dickens are you talking about? You said typewriter."
"I said typewriter," agreed Bones gravely. "I am speaking about my----"
A light dawned upon Hamilton.
"You mean your secretary?"
"I mean my secretary," said Bones.
"Good Heavens, Bones!" scoffed Hamilton. "Of course I shan't bother her. She's your private secretary, and naturally I wouldn't think of giving her work."
"Or orders," said Bones gently. "That's a point, dear old thing. I simply couldn't sit here and listen to you giving her orders. I should scream. I'm perfectly certain I can trust you, Ham. I know what you are with the girls, but there are times----"
"You know what I am with the girls?" said the wrathful Hamilton. "What the dickens do you know about me, you libellous young devil?"
Bones raised his hand.
"We will not refer to the past," he said meaningly and was so impressive that Hamilton began to search his mind for some forgotten peccadillo.
"All that being arranged to our mutual satisfaction, dear old partner," said