Magick Without Tears

268 MAGICK WITHOUT TEARS chock-a-block with moral lesson and economic theories and political summats; but there 's coincidence in it somewhere, and under coincidence down it shall go. Even if only by coincidence. From 1895 e.v. onwards I dealt with Colin Lunn. Of all the tobacconists under the sun, There is none, there is none, like the great Colin Lunn- of Sidney Street, Cambridge. When I started round the world, alas for fidelity! I began to forget him. By 1906 e.v. the operation was practically complete . In '42 e.v. I spent a few days with friends in Cambridge. Sauntering along K.P. (King's Parade to you , madam!) on my way back to the station with half an hour or so to kill, I thought I would pop in to Lunn's new shop there , and pass the time of day. He might have something to take my fancy. So I did. Needless to say, I didn't know the shopman from Adam, as he did not offer me a view of his identification mark. I asked after old friends ; we gossiped of old times and new; presently he observed, putting a hand under the counter: "I think this is yours sir." "How do you know who I am? I've never seen you before." "Oh , yes sir, I was the odd-job boy at the old Sidney Street shop ; I remember you quite well." By this time there lay on the co un ter a strange familiar-unfamiliar object-a pipe that I had left for some minor repair before hurrying off to the East 37 years before! I am smoking it now. And you can draw your own beastly conclusion! No, I have not forgotten that I am here to instruct as well as to amuse: also, to make certain observations which will, I flatter myself, be rather new to you. Everything that happens , no matter what, is an inconceivably improbable coincidence. You remember how you had to begin when you first came to me for help. I said to you, "Here are you, and no other person, come to see me,