This was one of James Jacobus Jelf's contributed efforts. It happened on this particular occasion that there was only one lord in England who owned a sky-blue car and blush-rose spats, and it cost Bones two hundred pounds to settle his lordship.
Soon after this, Bones disposed of the paper, and instructed Mr. Jelf not to call again unless he called in an ambulance--an instruction which afterwards filled him with apprehension, since he knew that J. J. J. would charge up the ambulance to the office.
Thus matters stood two days after his car had made its public appearance, and Bones sat confronting the busy pages of his garage bill.
On this day he had had his lunch brought into the office, and he was in a maze of calculation, when there came a knock at the door.
"Come in!" he yelled, and, as there was no answer, walked to the door and opened it.
A young man stood in the doorway--a young man very earnest and very mysterious--none other than James Jacobus Jelf.
"Oh, it's you, is it?" said Bones unfavourably "I thought it was somebody important."
Jelf tiptoed into the room and closed the door securely behind him.
"Old man," he said, in tones little above a whisper, "I've got a fortune for you."
"Dear old libeller, leave it with the lift-man," said Bones. "He has a wife and three children."
"I've got to get away at three o'clock, old man," he said.
"Don't let me keep you, old writer," said Bones with insolent indifference.
"I'd rather not say where I'm going," he volunteered. "It's a scoop, and if it leaked out, there would be the devil to pay."
"Oh!" said Bones, who knew Mr. Jelf well. "I thought it was something like that."
"I'd like to tell you, Tibbetts," said Jelf regretfully, "but you know how particular one has to be when one is dealing with matters affecting the integrity of ministers."
"I know, I know," responded Bones, wilfully dense, "especially huffy old vicars, dear old thing."
"Oh, them!" said Jelf, extending his contempt to the rules which govern the employment of the English language. "I don't worry about those poor funny things. No, I am speaking of a matter--you have heard about G.?" he asked suddenly.
"What!" he said incredulously. "You in the heart of things, and don't know about old G.?"