The Adventures of Romney Pringle/The Lizard’s Scale

IV.
THE LIZARD'S SCALE

"YOU'LL have to ground-bait very carefully," said the chatty old gentleman. "You won't do much with the roach unless you do. I found them quite off yesterday."
"Which is the best Broad for the fishing?" inquired Pringle as he reached across the table for the coffee.
"Pike! ah, poor sport just now," was the irrelevant reply. "No good before September."
Pringle repeated his question.
"Eh? Yes, I'm on my way back to Stanlowe after breakfast. Sorry I didn't hear you. I've gone rather deaf since I saw you last, and I can't find my conversation-tube this morning."
Since he first took his seat at the table, the deaf one had treated Pringle with a cordiality unusual, to say the least of it, between total strangers, and it began to dawn upon him that the old gentleman mistook him for some one else. Mr. Pringle, having turned his back on the shadowy literary agency which he professed in Furnival's Inn, had been bronzing his fair complexion for the last few days in the East Anglian sun. The fishing had proved disappointing, although the yachting had afforded some slender compensation, and the quietude of the little inn was not distasteful to a town-dweller.
"Have I ha

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