way; and so long as he looks as if he could pay his bill one doesn’t trouble much about him.  But this man interested me:  he was so uncommonly young and innocent-looking.  Besides, it was a dull hole of a place after the sort of jobs I’d been used to; and when you’ve been doing nothing for three months but waiting on commercial gents as are having an exceptionally bad season, and spoony couples with guide-books, you get a bit depressed, and welcome any incident, however slight, that promises to be out of the common.

I followed him up into his room, and asked him if I could do anything for him.  He flopped the hamper on the bed with a sigh of relief, took off his hat, wiped his head with his handkerchief, and then turned to answer me.

“Are you a married man?” says he.

It was an odd question to put to a waiter, but coming from a gent there was nothing to be alarmed about.

“Well, not exactly,” I says—­I was only engaged at that time, and that not to my wife, if you understand what I mean—­“but I know a good deal about it,” I says, “and if it’s a matter of advice—­”

“It isn’t that,” he answers, interrupting me; “but I don’t want you to laugh at me.  I thought if you were a married man you would be able to understand the thing better.  Have you got an intelligent woman in the house?”

“We’ve got women,” I says.  “As to their intelligence, that’s a matter of opinion; they’re the average sort of women.  Shall I call the chambermaid?”

“Ah, do,” he says.  “Wait a minute,” he says; “we’ll open it first.”

He began to fumble with the cord, then he suddenly lets go and begins to chuckle to himself.

“No,” he says, “you open it.  Open it carefully; it will surprise you.”

I don’t take much stock in surprises myself.  My experience is that they’re mostly unpleasant.

“What’s in it?” I says.

“You’ll see if you open it,” he says:  “it won’t hurt you.”  And off he goes again, chuckling to himself.

“Well,” I says to myself, “I hope you’re a harmless specimen.”  Then an idea struck me, and I stopped with the knot in my fingers.

“It ain’t a corpse,” I says, “is it?”

He turned as white as the sheet on the bed, and clutched the mantlepiece.  “Good God! don’t suggest such a thing,” he says; “I never thought of that.  Open it quickly.”

“I’d rather you came and opened it yourself, sir,” I says.  I was beginning not to half like the business.

“I can’t,” he says, “after that suggestion of yours—­you’ve put me all in a tremble.  Open it quick, man; tell me it’s all right.”

Well, my own curiosity helped me.  I cut the cord, threw open the lid, and looked in.  He kept his eyes turned away, as if he were frightened to look for himself.

“Is it all right?” he says.  “Is it alive?”

“It’s about as alive,” I says, “as anybody’ll ever want it to be, I should say.”