 The Romance's From Beasts and Super-Beasts, by Sarkie. It was autumn in London. That blessed season between the harshness of winter and the insincerities of summer, a trustful season when one buys bulbs and sees to the registration of one's vote, believing perpetually in spring and a change of government. Morton Crosby sat on a bench in a secluded corner of Hyde Park, lazily enjoying a cigarette, and watching the slow grazing promenade of a pair of snow-geese, the male looking rather like an albino edition of the Russitude Female. Out of the corner of his eye, Crosby also noted with some interest the hesitating hoverings of a human figure, which had passed and repassed his seat two or three times at shortening intervals, like a wary crow about to a light near some possibly edible morsel. Inevitably, the figure came to an anchorage on the bench within easy talking distance of its original occupant. The uncared foreclothes, the aggressive grizzled beard and the furtive evasive eye of the newcomer bespoke the professional cadger, the maul who would undergo hours of humiliating time-spinning and rebuff, rather than adventure on half a day's decent work. For a while the newcomer fixed his eyes straight in front of him in a strenuous, unseeing gaze. Then his voice broke out with the insinuating inflection of one who has a story to retail well worth any loiterer's while to listen to. It's a strange world, he said. As the statement met with no response, he altered it to the form of a question. I dare say you found it to be a strange world, mister. As far as I am concerned, said Crosby, the strangeness of warn-off in the course of thirty-six years. Ah! said the grey-beard, I could tell you things that you'd hardly believe, marvellous things that have really happened to me. Nowadays there is not demand for marvellous things that have really happened, said Crosby discouragingly. The professional writers of fiction turn these things out so much better. For instance my neighbours tell me wonderful, incredible things that they're Aberdeens and Chows and the Borsois have done. I never listen to them. On the other hand I have read the Hound of the Baskervilles three times. The grey-beard moved uneasily in his seat. Then he opened up new country. I take it that you are a professing Christian, he observed. I am a prominent, and I think I may say an influential member of the Muslim community of eastern Persia, said Crosby, making an excursion himself into the realms of fiction. The grey-beard was obviously disconcerted at this new check of introductory conversation, but the defeat was only momentary. Persia! I should never have taken you for a Persian, he remarked with a somewhat aggrieved air. I am not, said Crosby. My father was an Afghan. An Afghan? said the other, smitten into bewildered silence for a moment. Then he recovered himself and renewed his attack. Afghanistan! Ah, we've had some wars with that country now, I dare say. Instead of fighting it we might have learned something from it. A very wealthy country, I believe. No real poverty there. He raised his voice on the word, poverty, with a suggestion of intense feeling. Crosby saw the opening, and avoided it. It possesses, nevertheless, a number of highly talented and ingenious beggars, he said. If I had not spoken, so disparagingly, of marvellous things that have rarely happened, I would tell you the story of Ibrahim and the eleven camel-loads of blotting paper. Also I have forgotten exactly how it ended. My own life story is a curious one, said the stranger, apparently stifling all desire to hear the history of Ibrahim. I was not always, as you see me now. We are supposed to undergo complete change in the course of every seven years, said Crosby, as an explanation of the foregoing announcement. I mean, I was not always in such distressing circumstances as I am at present, pursued the stranger doggedly. That son's rather rude, said Crosby stifling, considering that you are at present talking to a man reputed to be one of the most gifted conversationalists of the Afghan border. I don't mean in that way, said the gravy ad hastily. I have been very much interested in your conversation. I was alluding to my unfortunate financial situation. You may hardly believe it, but at the present moment I am absolutely without a farving. Don't see any prospect of getting any money, either, for the next few days. I don't suppose you've ever found yourself in such a position, he added. In the town of Yom, said Crosby, which is in southern Afghanistan, and which also happens to be my birthplace, there was a Chinese philosopher who used to say that one of the three chiefest human blessings was to be absolutely without money. I forget what the other two were. Ah, I daresay, said the stranger in a tone that betrayed no enthusiasm for the philosopher's memory. And did he practice what he preached? There's the test. He lived happily with very little money or resources, said Crosby. And then I expect he had friends who would help him liberally whenever he was in difficulties, such as I am at present. In Yom, said Crosby, it is not necessary to have friends in order to obtain help. Any citizen of Yom would help a stranger as a matter of course. The greybeard was now genuinely interested. The conversation had at last taken a favourable turn. If someone like me, for instance, who was in undeserved difficulties, asked a citizen of that time you speak of, for a small loan to tide over a few days' impacuniosity, five shillings, or perhaps a rather larger sum, would it be given to him as a matter of course? There would be a certain preliminary, said Crosby, one would take him to a wine shop and treat him to a measure of wine, and then, after a little hyphleen conversation, one would put the desired sum in his hand and wish him good day. It is a roundabout way of performing a simple transaction, but in the east always a roundabout. The listener's eyes were glittering. Ah! he exclaimed, with a thin sneer ringing meaningly through his words. I suppose you have given up all those generous customs since you left your town. Don't practice them now, I expect. No one, who has lived in yom, said Crosby fervently, and remembers its green hills covered with apricot and almond trees, and the cold water that rushes down like a caress from the upland snows and dashes under the little wooden bridges. No one, who remembers these things and treasures the memory of them, would ever give up a single one of its unwritten laws and customs. To me they are as binding as though I still lived in that hallowed home of my use. Ah! then, if I was to ask you for a small loan—began the grey beard foringly edging nearer on the seat and hurriedly wondering how large he might safely make his request—if I was to ask you for, say, at any other time, certainly, said Crosby, in the months of November and December, however, it is absolutely forbidden for any one of our race to give or receive loans or gifts. In fact, one does not willingly speak of them. It is considered unlucky. We will therefore close this discussion. But it is still October! exclaimed the adventurer with an eager angry whine, as Crosby rose from his seat. Once eight days to the end of the month! The Afghan November began yesterday, said Crosby fervently, and in another moment he was striding across the park, leaving his recent companion scowling and muttering furiously on the seat. I don't believe a word of his story, he chatted to himself, back of nasty lies from beginning to end, which I told him so to his face, calling himself an Afghan. The snorts and snarls that escaped from him for the next quarter of an hour went far to support the truth of the old saying that two of a trade never agree. End of the Romances. THE SHARTS METACLOOM METHOD Lady Carlotta stepped out onto the platform of the small wayside station and took a turn or two up and down its uninteresting length, to kill time till the train shall be pleased to proceed on its way. Then in the roadway beyond she saw a horse struggling with a more than ample load and a carter of the sort that seems to bear a sullen hatred against the animal that helps him to earn a living. Lady Carlotta promptly betook her to the roadway and put rather a different complexion on the struggle. Certain of her acquaintances were wont to give her plentiful admonition as to the undesirability of interfering on behalf of a distressed animal, such interference being none of her business. Only once had she put the doctrine of non-interference into practice, when one of its most eloquent exponents had been besieged for nearly three hours in a small and extremely uncomfortable matry by an angry boar pig, while Lady Carlotta, on the other side of the fence, had proceeded with the water-colour sketched she was engaged on, and refused to interfere between the boar and his prisoner. It is to be feared that she lost the friendship of the ultimately rescued lady. On this occasion she merely lost the train, which gave way to the first sign of impatience it had shown throughout the journey and steamed off without her. She bore the desertion with philosophical indifference, her friends and relations were thoroughly well used to the fact of her luggage arriving without her. She wired a vague, non-committal message to her destination to say that she was coming on by another train. Before she had time to think what her next move might be, she was confronted by an imposingly attired lady, who seemed to be taking a prolonged mental inventory of her clothes and looks. You must be Miss Hope, the governess I've come to meet," said the apparition, in a tone that admitted of very little argument. Very well, if I must, I must," said Lady Carlotta to herself with dangerous meekness. I am Mrs. Quabal, continued the lady, and where, pray, is your luggage? It's gone astray," said the alleged governess, falling in with the excellent rule of life that the absent are always to blame. The luggage had, in point of fact, behaved with perfect correctitude. I've just telegraphed about it," she added, with a nearer approach to truth. How provoking! said Mrs. Quabal. These railway companies are so careless. However, my maid can lend you things for the night. And she led the way to her car. During the drive to the Quabal mansion, Lady Carlotta was impressively introduced to the nature of the charge that had been thrust upon her. She learned that Claude and Wilfred were delicate, sensitive young people, that Irene had the artistic temperament highly developed, and that Viola was something or other else of a mold equally commonplace among children of that class and type in the twentieth century. I wish them not only to be taught, said Mrs. Quabal, but interested in what they learn. In their history lessons, for instance, you must try to make them feel that they are being introduced to the life-stories of men and women who rarely lived, not merely committing a mass of names and dates to memory. French, of course, I shall expect you to talk at mealtimes several days in the week. I shall talk French four days of the week, and Russian in the remaining three. Russian! My dear Miss Hope, no one in the house speaks or understands Russian. That will not embarrass me in the least, said Lady Carlotta coldly. Mrs. Quabal, to use a colloquial expression, was knocked off her perch. She was one of those imperfectly self-assured individuals who are magnificent and autocratic as long as they are not seriously opposed. The least show of unexpected resistance goes a long way towards rendering them coy and apologetic. When the new governess failed to express wandering admiration of the large newly purchased and expensive car, and lightly eluded to the superior advantages of one or two makes which had just been put on the market, the discomforture of her patroness became almost abject. Her feelings were those which might have animated a general of ancient war-faring days on beholding his heaviest battle elephant, ignominiously driven off the field by slingers and javelin-throwers. At dinner that evening, although reinforced by her husband who usually duplicated her opinions and lent her moral support generally, Mrs. Quabal regained none of her lost ground. The governess not only helped herself well and truly to whine, but held forth with considerable show of critical knowledge on various vintage matters concerning which the Quabals were in no wise able to pose as authorities. Previous governesses had limited their conversation on the whine-topic to a respectful and doubtless sincere expression of a preference for water. When this one went as far as to recommend a whine-firm in whose hands you could not go very far wrong, Mrs. Quabal thought it time to turn the conversation into more usual channels. We got very satisfactory references about you, from Canon Teep, she observed. A very estimable man, I should think. Drinks like a fish, and beats his wife, otherwise a very lovable character, said the governess, imperturbably. My dear Miss Hope, I trust you are exaggerating," exclaimed the Quabals in unison. One must injustice admit that there is some provocation, continued the remancer. Mrs. Teep is quite the most irritating bridge-player that I have ever sat down with. Her leads and declarations would condone a certain amount of brutality in her partner, but to sauce her with the contents of the only soda-water siphon in the house on a Sunday afternoon, when one couldn't get another, argues an indifference to the comfort of others, which I cannot altogether overlook. You may think me hasty in my judgments, but it was practically on account of the so siphon incident that I left. We will talk of this some other time," said Mrs. Quabal hastily. I shall never allude to it again," said the governess with the decision. Mr. Quabal made a welcome diversion by asking what studies the new instructress proposed to inaugurate on the morrow. "'History to begin with,' she informed him. "'Ah, history,' he observed sagely. "'Now, in teaching them history, you must take care to interest them in what they learn. You must make them feel that they are being introduced to the life-stories of men and women who rarely lived. I've told her all that,' interposed Mrs. Quabal. "'I teach history on the Schartz Metaclume Method,' said the governess, loftily. "'Ah, yes,' said her listeners, thinking it expedient to an assume an acquaintance at least with the name. "'What are your children doing out here?' demanded Mrs. Quabal the next morning, on finding Ireney sitting rather glumly at the head of the stairs, while her sister was perched in an attitude of depressed discomfort on the window-seat behind her, with a wolf-skin rag almost covering her. "'We are having a history lesson,' came the unexpected reply. "'I am supposed to be Rome, and Viola up there is the She-Wolf. Not a real wolf, but the figure of one that the Romans used to set store by, I forget why. Claude and Wilfred have gone off to fetch the Shabby women.' "'The Shabby women?' "'Yes. They've got to carry them off. They didn't want to, but Miss Hope's got one of Father's fives bats, and said she'd give them a number-nine spanking if they didn't, so they've gone to do it.' "'A loud, angriest screaming from the direction of the lawn drew Mrs. Quabal thither in hot haste. Fearful lest the threatened castigation might even now be in process of inflection. The outcry, however, came principally from the two small daughters of the lodgekeeper, who were being hauled and pushed towards the house by the panting and disheveled Claude and Wilfred, whose task was rendered even more arduous by the incessant, if not very effectual, attacks of the captured and maiden's small brother. The governess, five's bat in hand, sat negligently on the stone balustrade, presiding over the scene with the cold impartiality of a goddess of battles. A furious and repeated chorus of "'O tell mother!' rose from the lodge-children, but the lodge-mother, who was hard of hearing, was for the moment immersed in the preoccupation of her wash-tub. After an apprehensive glance in the direction of the lodge, the good woman was gifted with the highly militant temper which is sometimes the privilege of deafness, Mrs. Quabal flew indignantly to the rescue of the struggling captives. Wilfred! Claude! Let those children go at once! Miss Hope! What on earth is the meaning of this scene? Early Roman history. The Sabine women, don't you know? It's the Schatz-Meterklu method to make children understand history by acting it themselves, fixes it in their memory, you know. Of course, if thanks to your interference your boys go through life thinking that the Sabine women ultimately escaped, I really cannot be held responsible. You may be very clever and modern, Miss Hope," said Mrs. Quabal firmly, but I should like you to leave here by the next train. Your luggage will be sent after you as soon as it arrives. I am not exactly certain where I shall be for the next few days," said the dismissed instructress of youth. You might keep my luggage, shall I wire my address? There are only a couple of trunks, some golf-clubs, and a leopard cub. A leopard cub, gasped Mrs. Quabal. Even in her departure this extraordinary person seemed destined to leave a trail of embarrassment behind her. Well, it's rather left off being a cub, it's more than half-grown, you know. Foul every day in a rabbit on Sundays is what it usually gets. Four beef makes it too excitable. Don't trouble about getting the car for me, I'm rather inclined for a walk." And Lady Carlotta strode out of the Quabal horizon. The advent of the genuine Miss Hope, who had made a mistake as to the day on which she was due to arrive, caused a turmoil which that good lady was quite unused to inspiring. Obviously the Quabal family had been woefully befooled, but a certain amount of relief came with the knowledge. How tiresome for you, dear Carlotta, said her hostess, when the overdue guest ultimately arrived. How very tiresome, losing your train and having to stop overnight in a strange place. Oh, dear no, said Lady Carlotta. Not a tall tiresome. For me. End of the Sharth Metaclume method. The Seventh Pullet from Beasts and Superbeasts by Saki. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Seventh Pullet by Saki. It's not the daily grind that I complain of, said Blinken's role presently. It's the dull, gray sameness of my life, outside of office hours. Nothing of interest comes my way. Nothing remarkable or out of the common. Even the little things that I do try to find some interest in don't seem to interest other people. Things in my garden, for instance. The potato that weighed just over two pounds, said his friend Gorworth. Did I tell you about that, said Blinkenthrope? I was telling the others in the train this morning. I forgot if I had told you. To be exact, you told me that it weighed just under two pounds. But I took into account the fact that abnormal vegetables and freshwater fish have an afterlife in which growth is not arrested. You're just like the others, said Blinkenthrope, sadly. You only make fun of it. The fault is with the potato, not with us, said Gorworth. We are not in the least interested in it because it is not in the least interesting. The men you go up in the train with every day are just in the same case as yourself. Their lives are commonplace and not very interesting to themselves, and they certainly are not going to wax enthusiastic over the commonplace events in other men's lives. Tell them something startling, dramatic, frequent, that has happened to yourself or to someone in your family, and you will capture their interest at once. They will talk about you with a certain personal pride to all their acquaintances. Man I know, intimately, fellow called Blinkenthrope, lives down by my way, had two of his fingers clawed clean off by a lobster he was carrying home to supper. Doctor says entire hand may have to come off. Now that is a conversation of a very high order. But imagine walking into a tennis club with the remark, I know a man who has grown a potato weighing two and a quarter pounds. But hang it all, my dear fellow said Blinkenthrope impatiently. Haven't I just told you that nothing of a remarkable nature ever happens to me? Invent something, said Goreworth. Since winning a prize for excellence in scriptural knowledge at a preparatory school, he had felt licensed to be a little more unscrupulous than the circle he moved in. Much might surely be excused to one who in early life could give a list of seventeen trees mentioned in the Old Testament. What sort of thing, asked Blinkenthrope somewhat snappishly, a snake got into your hen-run yesterday morning and killed six out of seven bullets, first mesmerizing them with its eyes, and then biting them as they stood helpless. The seventh bullet was one of that French sort with feathers all over its eyes, so it escaped the mesmeric snare and just flew at what it could see of the snake and pecked it to pieces. Thank you, said Blinkenthrope stiffly. It's a very clever invention. If such a thing had really happened in my poultry run, I admit I should have been proud and interested to tell people about it, but I'd rather stick to fact, even if it is plain fact, all the same his mind dwelt wistfully on the story of the seventh bullet. He could picture himself telling it in the train amid the absorbed interest of his fellow passengers. Unconsciously, all sorts of little details and improvements began to suggest themselves. Wistfulness was still his dominant mood when he took his seat in the railway carriage the next morning. Opposite him sat Stevenham, who had attained to a recognized brevity of importance through the fact of an uncle having dropped dead in the act of voting at a parliamentary election. That had happened three years ago, but Stevenham was still deferred to on all questions of home and foreign politics. Hello, how's the giant mushroom or whatever it was was all the notice Blinkenthrope got from his fellow travelers. Young Duckby, whom he mildly disliked, speedily monopolized the general attention by an account of a domestic bereavement. Had the four young pigeons carried off last night by a whacking big rat. Oh, a monster he must have been. You could tell by the size of the hole he made breaking into the loft. No moderate-sized rat ever seemed to carry out any predatory operations in these regions. They were all enormous in their enormity. Pretty hard lines that, continued Duckby, seeing that he had secured the attention and respect of the company. Four squeakers carried off at one swoop. You'd find it rather hard to match that in the way of unlooked-for bad luck. I had six bullets out of a pen of seven killed by a snake yesterday afternoon, said Blinkenthrope in a voice which he hardly recognized as his own. By a snake came an excited chorus. It fascinated them with his deadly glittering eyes, one after the other, and struck them down while they stood helpless. A bed-ridden neighbor who wasn't able to call for assistance, witnessed it all from her bedroom window. Well, I never broken the chorus with variations. The interesting part of it is about the seventh bullet, the one that didn't get killed, resumed Blinkenthrope, slowly lighting a cigarette. His diffidence had left him, and he was beginning to realize how safe and easy the gravity can seem once one has the courage to begin. The six dead birds were Menorcas. The seventh was a Houdan with a mop of feathers all over its eyes. It could hardly see the snake at all, so, of course, it wasn't mesmerized like the others. It just could see something wriggling on the ground and went for it and pecked it to death. Well, I'm blessed, exclaimed the chorus. In the course of the next few days, Blinkenthrope discovered how little the loss of one's self-respect affects one when one has gained the esteem of the world. His story found its way into one of the poultry papers and was copied thence into a daily news sheet as a matter of general interest. A lady wrote from the north of Scotland recounting a similar episode, which she had witnessed as occurring between a stoat and a blind grouse. Somehow, a lie seems so much less reprehensible when one can call it a lie. For a while, the adapter of the seventh bullet story enjoyed to the full his altered standing as a person of consequence, one who had had some share in the strange events of his times. Then, he was thrust once again into the cold gray background by the sudden blossoming into importance of Smith Padden, a daily fellow traveler whose little girl had been knocked down and nearly hurt by a car belonging to a musical comedy actress. The actress was not in the car at the time, but she was in numerous photographs which appeared in the illustrated papers of Zato Dobrin inquiring after the well-being of Maisie, daughter of Edmund Smith Padden, Esquire. With this new human interest to absorb them, the traveling companions were almost rude when Blinkentrop tried to explain his contrivance for keeping vipers and peregrine falcons out of his chicken run. Galworth, to whom he unburdened himself in private, gave him the same counsel as here for, invent something. Yes, but what? The ready affirmative coupled with the question betrayed a significant shifting of the ethical standpoint. It was a few days later that Blinkentrop revealed a chapter of family history to the customary gathering in the railway carriage. Curious thing happened to my aunt. The one who lives in Paris, he began. He had several aunts, but they were all geographically distributed over Greater London. She was sitting on a seat in the voie the other afternoon after lunching at the Romanian legation. Whatever the story gained in picturesqueness from the dragging in of diplomatic atmosphere, it ceased from that moment to command any acceptance as a record of current events. Galworth had warned his neophyte that this would be the case, but the traditional enthusiasm of the neophyte had triumphed over discretion. She was feeling rather drowsy, the effect probably of the champagne, which she's not in the habit of taking in the middle of the day. A subdued murmur of admiration went round the company. Blankentrop's aunts were not used to taking champagne in the middle of the year, regarding it exclusively as a Christmas and New Year accessory. Presently, a rather portly gentleman passed by her seat and paused an instant to light a cigar. At that moment, a youngish man came up behind him, drew the blade from a sword stick and stabbed him half a dozen times through and through. Scoundrel, he cried to his victim. You do not know me. My name is Henri Le Turc. The elder man wiped away some of the blood that was spattering his clothes, turned to his assailant and said, and since when has an attempted assassination been considered an introduction? Then he finished lighting his cigar and walked away. My aunt had intended screaming for the police, but seeing the indifference with which the principal in the affair treated the matter, she felt that it would be an impertence on her part to interfere. Of course, I need hardly say, she put the whole thing down to the effects of a warm, drowsy afternoon and the legation champagne. Now comes the astonishing part of my story. A fortnight later, a bank manager was stabbed to death with a sword stick in that very part of the voie. His assassin was the son of a charwoman formerly working at the bank who had been dismissed from her job by the manager on account of chronic intemperance. His name was Henri Le Turc. From that moment, Blenckentrop was tacitly accepted as the munchausen of the party. No effort was spared to draw him out from day to day in the exercise of testing their powers of credulity. And Blenckentrop, in the false security of an assured and receptive audience, waxed industrious and ingenious in supplying the demand for marvels. Duckby's satirical story of a tame otter that had a tank in the garden to swim in and the wind restlessly whenever the water rate was overdue was scarcely an unfair parody of some of Blenckentrop's wilder efforts. And then one day came nemesis. Returning to his villa one evening, Blenckentrop found his wife sitting in front of a pack of cards, which she was scrutinizing with unusual concentration. The same old patients game he asked carelessly, no, dear, this is the death's head patients, the most difficult of them all. I've never got it to work out and somehow I should be rather frightened if I did. Mother only got it out once in her life. She was afraid of it too. Her great aunt had done it once and fallen dead from excitement in the next moment. And mother always had a feeling that she would die if she ever got it out. She died the same night that she did it. She was in bad health at the time, certainly, but it was a strange coincidence. Don't do it if it frightens you, was Blenckentrop's practical comment as he left the room. A few minutes later, his wife called to him. John, it gave me such a turn. I nearly got it out. Only the five of diamonds held me up at the end. I really thought I'd done it. Why, you can do it, said Blenckentrop, who had come back into the room. If you shift the eight of clubs onto that open nine, the five can be moved on to the six. His wife made the suggested move with hasty, trembling fingers and piled the outstanding cards onto their respective packs. Then she followed the example of her mother and the great, great aunt. Blenckentrop had been genuinely fond of his wife, but in the midst of his bereavement, one dominant thought obtruded itself. Something sensational and real had at last come into his life. No longer was it a gray, colorless record. The headlines, which might appropriately describe his domestic tragedy, kept shaping themselves in his brain. Inherited presentment comes true. The Death's Head Patience card game that justified its sinister name in three generations. He wrote out a full story of the fatal occurrence for the Essex vedette, the editor of which was a friend of his. And to another friend, he gave a condensed account to be taken up in the office of one of the half-penny dailies. But in both cases, his reputation as a romancer stood fatally in the way of the fulfillment of his ambitions. Not the right thing to be munch-housing in a time of sorrow, agreed his friends among themselves. And a brief note of regret at the sudden death of the wife of our respected neighbor, Mr. John Blenckentrop from Heart Failure, appearing in the news column of the local paper, was the forlorn outcome of his visions of widespread publicity. Blenckentrop shrank from the society of his erstwhile traveling companions and took to traveling townwards by an earlier train. He sometimes tries to enlist a sympathy and attention of a chance acquaintance in details of the whistling prowess of his best canary or the dimensions of his largest beetroot. He scarcely recognizes himself as the man who was once spoken about and pointed out as the owner of the Seventh Pullet. End of the Seventh Pullet. The Blind Spot from Beasts and Superbeasts by Sarky. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information, auto-volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Blind Spot, by Sarky. You've just come back from Adelaide's funeral, haven't you? said Salalworth to his nephew. I suppose it was very like most other funerals. I'll tell you about it at lunch, said Egbert. You all do nothing of the sort. It wouldn't be respectful, either to your great aunt's memory or to the lunch. We begin with Spanish olives, then a borsch, then more olives and a bird of some kind and a rather enticing, relish wine, not at all expensive as wines go in this country, but still quite laudable in its way. Now, there's absolutely nothing in that menu that harmonizes in the least with the subject of your great aunt Adelaide or her funeral. She was a charming woman and quite as intelligent as she had any need to be, but somehow she always reminded me of an English cook's idea of a madras curry. She used to say that you were frivolous, said Egbert. Something in his tone suggested that he rather endorsed the verdict. I believe I once considerably scandalized her by declaring that clear soup was a more important factor in life than a clear conscience. She had very little sense of proportion. By the way, she made you her principal heir, didn't she? Yes, said Egbert, and executor as well. It's in that connection that I particularly want to speak to you. Business is not, my strong point at any time, said Salalworth, and certainly not when we're on the immediate threshold of lunch. It isn't exactly business, explained Egbert as he followed his uncle into the dining-room. It's something rather serious, very serious. Then we can't possibly speak about it now, said Salalworth. No one could talk seriously during a bosh, a beautifully constructed bosh, such as you are going to experience presently, ought not only to banish conversation, but almost to annihilate thought. Later on, when we arrive at the second stage of our lives, I shall be quite ready to discuss that new book on a borrow, or, if you prefer it, the present situation in the grand duchy of Luxembourg. But I absolutely decline to talk anything approaching business till we have finished with the bird. For the greater part of the meal, Egbert sat in an abstracted silence, the silence of a man whose mind is focused on one topic. When the coffee stage had been reached, he launched himself suddenly a thwart his uncle's reminiscences of the court of Luxembourg. I think I told you that great aunt Adelaide had made me her executor. There wasn't very much to be done in the way of legal matters, but I had to go through her papers. Oh, that would be a fairly heavy task in itself. I should imagine there were reams of family letters. Stacks of them. And most of them highly uninteresting. There was one packet, however, which I thought might repay a careful perusal. It was a bundle of correspondence from her brother Peter. The canon of tragic memory, said Lollworth. Exactly, of tragic memory, as you say, a tragedy that has never been fathomed. Probably the simplest explanation was the correct one, said Lollworth. He slipped on the stone staircase and fractured his skull in falling. Egbert shook his head. The medical evidence all went to prove that the blow on the head was struck by someone coming up behind him. A wound caused by violent contact with the steps could not possibly have been inflicted at that angle of the skull. They experimented with a dummy figure falling in every conceivable position. But the motive? exclaimed Sir Lollworth. No one had any interest in doing away with him, and the number of people who destroy canons of the established church for the mere fun of killing must be extremely limited. Of course there are individuals of weak mental balance who do that sort of thing, but they seldom conceal their handiwork. They are more generally inclined to parade it. His cock was under suspicion, said Egbert shortly. I know he was, said Sir Lollworth, simply because he was about the only person on the premises at the time of the tragedy. But could anything be sillier than trying to fasten a charge of murder onto Sebastian? He had nothing to gain, in fact, a good deal to lose from the death of his employer. The cannon was paying him quite as good wages as I was able to offer him when I took him over into my service. I have since raised them to something a little more in accordance with his real worth, but at the time he was glad to find a new place without troubling about an increase of wages. People were fighting rather shy of him, and he had no friends in this country. No, if anyone in the world was interested in the prolonged life and unimpaired digestion of the cannon, it would certainly be Sebastian. People don't always weigh the consequences of their rash acts, said Egbert. Otherwise there would be very few murders committed. Sebastian is a man of hot temper. He is a southerner, admitted Sir Lollworth. To be geographically exact, I believe he hails from the French slopes of the Pyrenees. I took that into consideration when he nearly killed the gardener's boy the other day for bringing him a spurious substitute for sorrel. One must always make allowances for origin and locality and early environment. Tell me your longitude, and I'll know what latitude to allow you is my motto. There, you see, said Egbert. He nearly killed the gardener's boy. My dear Egbert, between nearly killing a gardener's boy and altogether killing a cannon, there is a wide difference. No doubt you have often felt a temporary desire to kill a gardener's boy. You have never given way to it, and I respect you for your self-control. But I don't suppose you have ever wanted to kill an octogenarian cannon. Besides, as far as we know, there had never been any quarrel or disagreement between the two men. The evidence at the inquest brought that out very clearly. Ah! said Egbert, with the air of a man coming at last into a deferred inheritance of conversational importance. That is precisely what I want to speak to you about. He pushed away his coffee cup, and drew a pocketbook from his inner breast pocket. From the depths of the pocketbook he produced an envelope, and from the envelope he extracted a letter, closely written in a small, neat handwriting. One of the cannon's numerous letters to Aunt Adelaide, he explained, written a few days before his death. Her memory was already failing when she received it, and I daresay she forgot the contents as soon as she read it. Otherwise, in the light of what subsequently happened, we should have heard something of this letter before now. If it had been produced at the inquest, I fancy it would have made some difference in the course of affairs. The evidence, as you remarked just now, choked off suspicion against Sebastian by disclosing an utter absence of anything that could be considered a motive or provocation for the crime, if crime there was. Oh, read the letter! Said Salah worth impatiently. It's a long rambling affair, like most of his letters in his later years, said Egbert. I'll read the part that bears immediately on the mystery. I very much fear I shall have to get rid of Sebastian. He cooks divinely, but he has the temper of a fiend, or an anthropoid ape, and I am rarely in bodily fear of him. We had a dispute the other day, as to the correct sort of lunch to be served on Ash Wednesday, and I got so irritated and annoyed at his conceit and obstinacy, that at last I threw a cupful of coffee in his face, and called him at the same time an impudent jack-a-napes. Very little of the coffee went actually in his face, but I have never seen a human being show such deplorable lack of self-control. I laughed at the threat of killing me that he spluttered out in his rage, and thought that the whole thing would blow over, but I have several times since caught him scowling and muttering in a highly unpleasant fashion, and lately I have fancied that he was dogging my footsteps about the grounds, particularly when I walk of an evening in the Italian garden. It was on the steps in the Italian garden that the body was found, commented Egbert, and resumed reading. I dare say the danger is imaginary, but I shall feel more at ease when he has quitted my service. Egbert paused for a moment at the conclusion of the extract, then, as his uncle made no remark, he added, If lack of motive was the only factor that saved Sebastian from prosecution, I fancy this letter will put a different complexion on matters. Have you shown it to any one else? asked Salulworth, reaching out his hand for the incriminating piece of paper. No, said Egbert, handing it across the table. I thought I'd tell you about it first. Heavens, what are you doing? Egbert's voice rose almost to a scream. Salulworth had flung the paper well and truly into the glowing centre of the grate. The small neat handwriting shriveled into black flaky nothingness. What on earth did you do that for? gasped Egbert. That letter was our one piece of evidence to connect Sebastian with the crime. That is why I destroyed it, said Salulworth. But why should you want to shield him? cried Egbert. The man is a common murderer. A common murderer, possibly, but a very uncommon cook. End of The Blind Spot Dusk from Beasts and Superbeasts by Sarkie This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Andrew Coleman Dusk by Sarkie Norman Gortsby sat on a bench in the park, with his back to a strip of bush-planted sword, fenced by the park railings, and the row fronting him across a wide stretch of carriage-drive. Hyde Park Corner, with its rattle and hoot of traffic, lay immediately to his right. It was some thirty minutes past six, on an early March evening, and Dusk had fallen heavily over the scene, Dusk mitigated by some faint moonlight, and many streetlamps. There was a wide emptiness over road and sidewalk, and yet there were many unconsidered figures moving silently through the half-light, or dotted unobtrusively on bench and chair, scarcely to be distinguished from the shadowed gloom in which they sat. The scene pleased Gortsby, and harmonized with his present mood. Dusk, to his mind, was the hour of the defeated. Men and women, who had fought and lost, who hid their fallen fortunes and dead hopes, as far as possible from the scrutiny of the curious, came forth in this hour of gloaming, when their shabby clothes and bowed shoulders, and unhappy eyes might pass unnoticed, or, at any rate, unrecognized. A king that is conquered must see strange looks, so bitter a thing is the heart of man. The wanderers in the Dusk did not choose to have strange looks fasten on them. Therefore they came out in this bad fashion, taking their pleasure sadly in a pleasure-ground that had emptied of its rightful occupants. Beyond the sheltering screen of bushes and palinks came a realm of brilliant lights, and noisy, rushing traffic. A blazing, many-tiered stretch of windows, shone through the Dusk and almost dispersed it, marking the haunts of those other people, who held their own in life's struggle, or, at any rate, had not had to admit failure. So Gortsby's imagination pictured things as he sat on his bench in the almost deserted walk. He was in the mood to count himself among the defeated. Money troubles did not press on him. Had he so wished, he could have strolled into the thoroughfares of light and noise, and taken his place among the jostling ranks of those who enjoyed prosperity, or struggled for it. He had failed in a more subtle ambition, and for the moment he was heart-sore and disillusionised, and not disinclined to take a certain cynical pleasure in observing and labelling his fellow wanderers as they went their ways in the dark stretches between the lamp-lights. On the bench by his side sat an elderly gentleman with a drooping air of defiance, that was probably the remaining vestige of self-respect in an individual who had ceased to defy successfully any body or anything. His clothes could scarcely be called shabby. At least they passed muster in the half-light, but one's imagination could not have pictured the wearer embarking on the purchase of a half-crowned box of chocolates, or laying out nine-pence on a carnation buttonhole. He belonged unmistakably to that forlorn orchestra, to whose piping no one dances. He was one of the world's lamentors, who induces no responsive weeping. As he rose to go, God's bee imagined him returning to a home-circle, where he was snubbed and of no account, or to some bleak lodging where his ability to pay a weekly bill was the beginning and end of the interest he inspired. His retreating figure vanished slowly into the shadows, and his place on the bench was taken almost immediately by a young man, fairly well dressed, but scarcely more cheerful of mean than his predecessor. As if to emphasise the fact that the world went badly with him, the newcomer unburdened himself of an angry and very audible expletive, as he flunked himself into the seat. You don't seem in a very good temper, said God's bee, judging that he was expected to take due notice of the demonstration. The young man turned to him with a look of disarming frankness, which put him instantly on his guard. You wouldn't be in a good temper if you were in the fix I'm in. He said, I've done the silliest thing I've ever done in my life. Yes, said God's bee dispassionately, came up this afternoon, meaning to stay at the Patagonian Hotel in Buckshire Square, continued the young man. When I got there, I found it had been pulled down some weeks ago, at a cinema theatre run up on the site. The taxi driver recommended me to another hotel some way off, and I went there. I just sent a letter to my people, giving them the address, and then I went out to buy some soap. I'd forgotten to pack any, and I hate using hotel soap. Then I strolled about a bit, had a drink at a bar, and looked at the shops, and when I came to turn my steps back to the hotel, I suddenly realised that I didn't remember its name, or even what street it was in. There's a nice predicament for a fellow who hasn't any friends or connections in London. Of course I can wire to my people for the address, but they won't have got my letter till tomorrow. Meantime, I'm without any money, came out with about a shilling on me, which went in buying the soap and getting the drink, and here I am, one drink about with tuppence in my pocket, and nowhere to go for the night. It was an eloquent pause after the story had been told. I suppose you think I've spun you rather an impossible yarn, said the young man presently, with a suggestion of resentment in his voice. Not at all impossible, said courtspeed judicially. I remember doing exactly the same thing once in a foreign capital, and on that occasion there were two of us, which made it more remarkable. Luckily we remembered that the hotel was on a sort of canal, and when we struck the canal we were able to find our way back to the hotel. The youth brightened at the reminiscence. In a foreign city I wouldn't mind so much, he said. One could go to one's console and get the requisite help from him. Here in one's own land one is far more derelict if one gets into a fix, and thus I can find some decent chap to swan my story and lend me some money. I seem likely to spend the night on the embankment. I'm glad, anyhow, that you don't think the story outrageously improbable. He threw a good deal of warmth into the last remark, as though perhaps to indicate his hope that courtspeed did not fall far short of the requisite decency. Of course, said courtspeed slowly, the weak point of your story is that you can't produce the soap. The young man sat forward hurriedly, felt rapidly in the pockets of his overcoat, and then jumped to his feet. I must have lost it! he muttered angrily. To lose a hotel and a cake of soap on one afternoon suggests willful carelessness, said courtspeed. But the young man scarcely waited to hear the end of the remark. He flitted away down the path, his head held high, with an air of somewhat cheated jauntiness. It was a pity, mused courtspeed. The going out to get one's own soap was the one convincing touch in the whole story, and yet it was just that little detail that brought him to grief. If he had had the brilliant forethought to provide himself with a cake of soap, wrapped and sealed with all the solicitude of the chemist's counter, he would have been a genius in his particular line. In his particular line, genius certainly consists of an infinite capacity for taking precautions. With that reflection, courtspeed rose to go. As he did so, an exclamation of concern escaped him. Lying on the ground by the side of the bench was a small oval packet wrapped and sealed with the solicitude of a chemist's counter. It could be nothing else but a cake of soap, and it had evidently fallen out of the youth's overcoat pocket when he flunked himself down on the seat. In another moment courtspeed was scutting along the dusk- shrouded path in anxious quest for a youthful figure in a light overcoat. He had nearly given up the search when he caught sight of the object of his pursuit standing irresolutely on the border of the carriage-drive, evidently uncertain whether to strike across the park or make for the bustling pavements of Knightsbridge. He turned round sharply with an air of defensive hostility when he found Gortsby hailing him. The important witness to the genuineness of your story has turned up, said Gortsby. Holding out the cake of soap, it must have slid out of your overcoat pocket when you sat down on the seat. I saw it on the ground after you left. You must excuse my disbelief, but appearances were really rather against you. And now, as I appeal to the testimony of the soap, I think I ought to abide by its verdict. If the loan of a sovereign is any good to you. The young man hastily removed all doubt on the subject by pocketing the coin. Here is my card with my address, continued Gortsby. Any day this week will do for returning the money. And here is the soap. Don't lose it again. It's been a good friend to you. Lucky thing you're finding it, said the youth, and then with a catch in his voice he blurted out a word or two of thanks and fled headlong in the direction of Knightsbridge. Poor boy. He has nearly as possible broke down, said Gortsby to himself. I don't wonder, either. The relief from his quandary must have been acute. It's a lesson to me not be too clever in judging by circumstances. As Gortsby retraced his steps past the seat where the little drama had taken place, he saw an elderly gentleman poking and peering beneath it, and on all sides of it, and recognized his earlier fellow-occupant. Have you lost anything, sir? he asked. Yes, sir. A cake of soap. End of dusk. A Touch of Realism From Beasts and Superbeasts by Sarky This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings win the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Andrew Coleman. A Touch of Realism by Sarky I hope you've come full of suggestions for Christmas. said Lady Blonde's to her latest-derived guest. The old-fashioned Christmas and the up-to-date Christmas are both so pleaded out. I want to have something really original this year. I was staying with Matheson's last month, said Blanche-Bove, your legally, and we had such a good idea. Everyone in the house-party had to be a character, and behave consistently all the time, and at the end of the visit one had to guess what everyone's character was. The one who was voted to have acted his or her character best got a prize. It sounds amusing, said Lady Blonde's. I was St. Francis of Assisi, continued Blanche. We hadn't got to keep to our right sexes. I kept getting up in the middle of a meal and throwing out food to the birds. You see, the chief thing that one remembers of St. Francis is that he was fond of the birds. Everyone was so stupid about it, and thought that I was the old man who feeds the sparrows in the Tuileries' gardens. Then Colonel Pentley was the jolly miller on the banks of Dee. How on earth did he do that? asked Bertie Van Tarn. He laughed and sang from mourn till night, explained Blanche. How dreadful for the rest of you, said Bertie. At any way, he wasn't on the banks of Dee. One had to imagine that, said Blanche. If you could imagine all that, you might as well imagine cattle on the further bank, and keep on calling them home, Mary-Fashion, across the sands of Dee. You might change the river to the Yarrow, and imagine it was on the top of you, and say you were Willie, or whoever it was, drowned in Yarrow. Of course it's easy to make fun of it, said Blanche sharply. But it was extremely interesting and amusing. The price was rather a fiasco, though. You see, Millie Matheson said her character was Lady Bountiful, and as she was our hostess, of course we all had to vote that she carried out her character better than anyone. Otherwise, I ought to have got the price. It's quite an idea for a Christmas party, said Lady Blanche. We must certainly do it here. Sir Nicholas was not so enthusiastic. Are you quite sure, my dear, that you're wise in doing this thing, he said to his wife, when they were alone together? It might do very well at the Mathesons, where they had rather a staid, elderly house party. But here it will be a different matter. There is the Dermot flapper, for instance, who simply stops at nothing, and you know what Van Tarn is like. Then there is Cyril Scatterley. He has madness on one side of his family, and a Hungarian grandmother on the other. I don't see what they could do that would matter, said Lady Blanche. It's the unknown that is to be dreaded, said Sir Nicholas. If Scatterley took it into his head to represent a ball of Bacchan, well, I'd rather not be here. Of course, we can't allow any Bible characters. Besides, I don't know what the balls of Bacchan really did that was so very dreadful. They just came round and gaped as far as I remember. My dear, you don't know what Scatterley's Hungarian imagination might have read into the pot. It would be small satisfaction to say it to him afterwards. You've behaved as no ball of Bacchan would have behaved. Oh, you're an alarmist, said Lady Blanche. I particularly want to have this idea carried out. It will be sure to be talked about a lot. That is quite possible, said Sir Nicholas. Dinner that evening was not a particularly lively affair. The strain of trying to impersonate a self-imposed character, or to glean hints of identity from other people's conduct, acted as a check on the natural festivity of such a gathering. There was a general feeling of gratitude and acquiescence when good-natured Rachel Clamestine suggested that there should be an hour or two respite from the game, while they all listened to a little piano playing after dinner. Rachel's love of piano music was not indiscriminate, and concentrated itself chiefly on selections rendered by her idolized offspring, Moritz and Augusta, who, to do them justice, played remarkably well. The Clamestines were deservedly popular as Christmas guests. They gave expensive gifts lavishly on Christmas Day and New Year. And Mrs Clamestine had already dropped hints of her intention to present the prize for the best enacted character in the game competition. Everyone had brightened up this prospect, if it had fallen to Lady Blonde's as hostess to provide the prize, she would have considered that a little souvenir of some twenty or twenty-five Schilling's value would meet the case, whereas coming from a Clamestine source it would certainly run to several guineas. The closed time for impersonation efforts came to an end with the final withdrawal of Moritz and Augusta from the piano. Blanche Boveal retired early, leaving the room in a series of laboured leaps that she hoped might be recognised as a tolerable imitation of Pavlova. Vera Dermott, the sixteen-year-old flapper, expressed her confident opinion that the performance was intended to typify Mark Twain's famous jumping frog, and her diagnosis of the case found general acceptance. Another guest to set an example of early bed-going was Waldo Plubbly, who conducted his life on a minutely-regulated system of timetables and hygienic routine. Waldo was a plump, indolent young man of seven and twenty, whose mother had early in his life decided for him that he was unusually delicate, and by dint of much coddling and home-keeping had succeeded in making him physically silent and mentally peevish. Nine hours unbroken sleep, preceded by elaborate breathing exercises and other hygienic ritual, was among the indispensable regulations which Waldo imposed on himself, and there were innumerable small observances which he exacted from those who in any way obliged to minister to his requirements. A special teapot for the decoction of his early tea was always solemnly handed over to the bedroom staff of any house in which he happened to be staying. No one had ever quite mastered the mechanism of this precious vessel, but Bertie Van Tarn was responsible for the legend that its spout had to be kept facing north during the process of infusion. On this particular night the irreducible nine hours were severely mutilated by the sudden, and by no means noiseless, incursion of a pajama-clad figure into Waldo's room at an hour midway between midnight and dawn. What is the matter? What are you looking for? asked the awakened and astonished Waldo, slowly recognising Van Tarn, who appeared to be searching hastily for something he had lost. Looking for sheep, was the reply. Sheep? exclaimed Waldo. Yes, sheep, you don't suppose I'm looking for Jim Raphs, do you? I don't see why you should expect to find either in my room, retorted to Waldo furiously. I can't argue the matter at this hour of the night, said Bertie, and began hastily rummaging in the chest of drawers. Shirts and underwear went flying on to the floor. There are no sheep here, I tell you! screamed Waldo. I've only got your word for it, said Bertie, whisking most of the bed clothes on to the floor. If you weren't concealing something, you wouldn't be so agitated. Waldo was by this time convinced that Van Tarn was grieving mad, and made an anxious effort to humour him. Go back to bed, like a dear fellow, he pleaded, and your sheep will turn up all right in the morning. I dare say, said Bertie gloomily, without their tails, nice fall I shall look with a lot of max sheep. And by way of emphasising his annoyance at the prospect, he sent Waldo's pillows flying to the top of the wardrobe. But why no tails? asked Waldo, whose teeth were chattering with fear and rage and lowered temperature. My dear boy, have you never heard the ballad of Little Boat Peep? said Bertie with a chuckle. It's my character in the game, you know. If I didn't go hunting about for my lost sheep, no one would be able to guess who I was, and now go to sleepy weeps like a good child, or I shall be crossed with you. I leave you to imagine, wrote Waldo in the course of a long letter to his mother, how much sleep I was able to recover that night, and you know how essential nine uninterrupted hours of slumber are to my health. On the other hand, he was able to devote some wakeful hours to exercises in breathing roth and fury against Bertie Van Tarn. Breakfast at Blonde's Court was a scattered meal, on the Come When You Please principle. But the house party was supposed to gather in full strength at lunch. On the day after the game had been started, there were, however, some notable absentees. Waldo Plubbly, for instance, was reported to be nursing a headache. A large breakfast at an ABC had been taken up to his room. But he had made no appearance in the flesh. I expect he's playing up to some character, said Vera Dermott. Isn't there a think of Moria's Le Malade Imagineur? I expect he's that. Eight or nine lists came out, and were duly penciled with the suggestion. And where are the clamestines? asked Lady Blonde's. They're usually so ponchal. And now the character posed, perhaps, said Bertie Van Tarn. They lost ten tribes. But there were only three of them. Besides, they want their lunch. Hasn't anyone seen anything of them? Didn't you take them out in your car? Asked Blonde's both of you, addressing herself to Cyril Scatterley. Yes, took them out to slogbury more immediately after breakfast. Miss Dermott came too. I saw you and Vera come back, said Lady Blonde's. But I didn't see the clamestines. Did you put them down in the village? No, said Scatterley shortly. But where are they? Where did you leave them? We left them on slogbury more, said Vera calmly. On slogbury more? Why, it's more than thirty miles away. How are they going to get back? We didn't stop to consider that, said Scatterley. We asked them to get out for a moment on the pretence that the car had stuck, and then we dashed off full speed and left them there. But how dare you do such a thing? It's most inhuman. Why, it's been snowing for the last hour. I expect there'll be a cottage or farmhouse somewhere if they walk a mile or two. But why on earth have you done it? The question came in a chorus of indignant bewilderment. That would be telling what our characters are meant to be, said Vera. Didn't I warn you? says Sir Nicholas tragically to his wife. It's something to do with Spanish history. We don't mind giving you that clue, said Scatterley, helping himself cheerfully to salad. And then Bertie Van Tarn broke forth into peals of joyous laughter. I've got it! Verdunad and Isabella deporting the Jews. Oh, lovely! Those two have certainly won the prize. We shan't get anything to beat that for thoroughness. Lady Blondie's Christmas party was talked about and written about, to an extent that she had not anticipated in her most ambitious moments. The letters from Waldo's mother would alone have made it memorable. End of A Touch of Realism. Cousin Theresa from Beasts and Superbeasts by Sarky This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Andrew Corman Cousin Theresa by Sarky Bassett Harrowclough returned to the home of his fathers after an absence of four years, distinctly well pleased with himself. He was only thirty-one, but he had put in some useful service in and out of the way, though not an important corner of the world. He had quieted a province, kept open a trade route, enforced the tradition of respect, which is worth the ransom of many kings in out of the way regions, and done the whole business on rather less expenditure than would be requisite for organising a charity in the home country. In Whitehall and places where they think, they doubtless thought well of him. It was not inconceivable, his father allowed himself to imagine, that Bassett's name might figure in the next list of honours. Bassett was inclined to be rather contemptuous of his half-brother Lucas, whom he found feverishly engrossed in the same middle of elaborate futilities that had claimed his whole time and energies, such as they were, four years ago, and almost as far back before that as he could remember. It was the contempt of the man of action for the man of activities, and it was probably reciprocated. Lucas was an over-well-nourished individual, some nine years Bassett's senior, with a colouring that would have been accepted as a sign of intensive culture in an asparagus, but probably meant in this case mere abstention from exercise. His hair and forehead furnished a recessional note, in a personality that was in all other respects obtrusive and assertive. There was certainly no semitic blood in Lucas's parentage, but his appearance contrived to convey at least a suggestion of Jewish extraction. Clovis Sangrell, who knew most of his associates by sight, said it was undoubtedly a case of protective mimicry. Two days after Bassett's return, Lucas risked in to lunch in a state of twittering excitement that could not be restrained even for the immediate consideration of soup, but had to be verbally discharged in spluttering competition with mouthfuls of vermicelli. I've got hold of an idea for something immense, he babbled, something that is simply it. Bassett gave a short laugh that would have done equally well as a snort, if one had wanted to make the exchange. His half-brother was in the habit of discovering futilities that were simply it, at frequently recurring intervals. The discovery generally meant that he flew up to town, preceded by glowingly worded telegrams, to see someone connected with the stage or the publishing world, got together one or two momentous luncheon parties, flitted in and out of gambrinas for one or two evenings, and returned home with an air of subdued importance, and the asparagus tint slightly intensified. The great idea was generally forgotten a few weeks later in the excitement of some new discovery. The inspiration came to me whilst I was dressing, announced Lucas, it will be THE thing in the next Music Hall review. All London will go mad over it. It's just a couplet, of course there will be other words, but they won't matter, listen. Cousin Theresa takes out Caesar, Fido Jock and the big Bortsoi, lilting catchy sort of refrain you see, and big drum business on the two syllables of Bortsoi. It's immense, and I've thought out all the business of it. The singer will sing the first verse alone, then during the second verse, Cousin Theresa will walk through, followed by four wooden dogs on wheels. Caesar will be Nourish Terrier, Fido a Black Poodle, Jock a Fox Terrier, and the Bortsoi, of course, will be a Bortsoi. During the third verse, Cousin Theresa will come on alone, and the dogs will be drawn across by themselves from the opposite wink. Then Cousin Theresa will catch onto the singer, and go off stage in one direction, while dogs precession goes off in the other, crossing en route, which is always very effective. There'll be a lot of applause there, and for the fourth verse, Cousin Theresa will come on in sables, and the dogs will all have coats on. Then I've got a great idea for the fifth verse, each of the dogs will be led on by a nut, and Cousin Theresa will come on from the opposite side, crossing en route, always effective, and then she turns around, and leads the whole lot of them off on a string, and all the time, everyone's sinking like mad. Cousin Theresa takes out Caesar, Fido, Jock, and the big Bortsoi. Drone business on the two last syllables. I'm so excited, I shan't sleep a wink tonight. I'm off tomorrow by the 10.15. I've wired to Hermanova to lunch with me. If any of the rest of the family felt any excitement over the creation of Cousin Theresa, they were signally successful in concealing the fact. Paul Lucas does take his silly little ideas seriously, said Colonel Harrow-Clough afterwards in the smoking-room. Yes, said his younger son, in a slightly less tolerant tone. In a day or two he'll come back and tell us that his sensational masterpiece is above the heads of the public, and in about three weeks' time he'll be wild with enthusiasm over a scheme to dramatise the poems of Herrick or something equally promising. And then an extraordinary thing befell. In defiance of all precedent, Lucas' glowing anticipations were justified and endorsed by the course of events. If Cousin Theresa was above the heads of the public, the public heroically adapted itself to her altitude. Introduced as an experiment at a dull moment in a new review, the success of the item was unmistakable. The calls were so insistent and uproarious that even Lucas' ample devisings of additional business scarcely suffice to keep pace with the demand. Packed houses on successive evenings confirmed the verdict of the first night audience. Stalls and boxes filled significantly just before the turn came on, and emptied significantly after the last encore had been given. The manager tearfully acknowledged that Cousin Theresa was it. Stagehands and supers and programme sellers acknowledged it to one another without the least reservation. The name of the review dwindled to secondary importance and vast letters of electric blue blazoned the words Cousin Theresa from the front of the Greek palace of pleasure. And, of course, the magic of the famous refrain laid its spell all over the metropolis. Restaurant proprietors were obliged to provide the members of their orchestras with painted wooden dogs on wheels in order that the much demanded and always conceded melody should be rendered with the necessary spectacular effects, and the crash of bottles and forks on the tables at the mention of the big bortsoi usually drowned the sincerest efforts of drum or cymbals. Nowhere, and at no time could one get away from the double thump that brought up the rear of the refrain. Revelers reeling home at night banged it on doors and hoardings. Milkman clashed their cans to its cadence. Messenger boys hit smaller messenger boys, resounding double smacks on the same principle. And the more thoughtful circles of the great city were not deaf to the claims and significance of the popular melody. An enterprising and emancipated preacher discoursed from his pulpit on the inner meaning of Cousin Theresa, and Lucas Harrowclough was invited to lecture on the subject of his great achievement to members of the Young Men's Endeavour League, the Nine Arts Club, and other learned and willing to learn bodies. In society it seemed to be the one thing people really cared to talk about. Men and women of middle age and average education might be seen together in corners earnestly discussing not the question whether Serbia should have an outlet on the Adriatic, or the possibilities of a British success in international polo contests, but the more absorbing topic of the problematic Aztec or nylotic origin of the Theresa motif. Politics and patriotism are so boring and so out of date, said a revered lady who had some pretensions to irracula utterance. We are too cosmopolitan nowadays to be really moved by them. That is why one welcomes an intelligible production like Cousin Theresa that has a genuine message for one. One can't understand the message all at once, of course, but one felt from the very first that it was there. I've been to see it eighteen times, and I'm going again tomorrow and on Thursday. One can't see it often enough. It would be rather a popular move if we gave this Harrowclough person a knighthood or something of the sort, said the minister reflectively. Which Harrowclough? asked his secretary. Which? There is only one, isn't there? said the minister. The Cousin Theresa man, of course. I think everyone would be pleased if we knighted him. Yes, you can put him down on the list of certainties, under the letter L. The letter L, said the secretary, who was new to his job, does at stand for liberalism or liberality. Most of the recipients of ministerial favour were expected to qualify in both of those subjects. Literature, explained the minister. And thus, after a fashion, Colonel Harrowclough's expectation of seeing his son's name in the list of honours was gratified. End of Cousin Theresa The Yarkand Manor by Sarky Solulworth Quain was making a leisurely progress through the Zoological Society's Gardens, in company with his nephew, recently returned from Mexico. The latter was interested in comparing and contrasting allied types of animals occurring in the North American and Old World fauna. One of the most remarkable things in the wandering of species, he observed, is the sudden impulse to trek and migrate that breaks out now and again for no apparent reason in communities of hitherto staid home animals. In human affairs, the same phenomenon is occasionally noticeable, said Solulworth. Perhaps the most striking instance of it occurred in this country, while you were away in the wilds of Mexico. I mean the wander fever, which suddenly displayed itself in the managing and editorial staffs of certain London newspapers. It began with the stampede of the entire staff of one of our most brilliant and enterprising weeklies to the banks of the Seine and the heights of Montmartre. The migration was a brief one, but it heralded an era of restlessness in the press world, which lent quite a new meaning to the phrase newspaper circulation. Other editorial staffs were not slow to imitate the example that had been set them. Paris soon dropped out of fashion as being too near home. Nuremberg, Seville and Salonica became more favoured as planting outgrounds for the personnel of not only weekly, but daily papers as well. The localities were perhaps not always well chosen. The fact of a leading organ of evangelical thought being edited for two successive fortnights from Truville and Monte Carlo was generally admitted to have been a mistake. And even when enterprising and adventurous editors took themselves and their staffs further afield, there were some unavoidable clashings. For instance, the Scrutator, Sporting Bluff, and the Damsel's own paper all pitched on cartoon for the same week. It was perhaps a desire to out-distance all possible competition that influenced the management of the Daily Intelligencer, one of the most solid and respected organs of liberal opinion, in its decision to transfer its offices for three or four weeks from Fleet Street to Eastern Turkestan, allowing, of course, a necessary margin of time for the journey there and back. This was, in many respects, the most remarkable of all the press stampede that were experienced at this time. There was no make-believe about the undertaking, proprietor, manager, editor, sub-editors, leader-writers, principal-reporters, and so forth. All took part in what was popularly alluded to as the Drangnach Ostern. An intelligent and efficient office boy was all that was left in the deserted hive of editorial individuals. That was doing things rather thoroughly, wasn't it? said the nephew. Where, you see, said Salalworth, the migration idea was falling somewhat into disrepute from the half-hearted manner in which it was occasionally carried out. You were not impressed by the information that such a paper was being edited and brought out at Lisbon or Innsbrook, if you chance, to see the principal leader-writer or the art-editor lunching as usual at their accustomed restaurants. The daily intelligentser was determined to give no loophole for cavill at the genuineness of its pilgrimage, and it must be admitted that to a certain extent the arrangements made for transmitting copy and carrying on the usual features of the paper during the long outward journey worked smoothly and well. The series of articles which commenced at Baku on what cobbdynism might do for the camel industry ranks among the best of the recent contributions to free trade literature, while the views on foreign policy enunciated from a roof in Yarkand showed at least as much grasp of the international situation as those that had germinated within half a mile of Downing Street. Quite in keeping, too, with the older and better traditions of British journalism was the manner of the homecoming, no bombast, no personal advertisement, no flamboyant interviews, even a complimentary luncheon at the Voyager's Club was courteously declined. Indeed, it began to be felt that the self-effacement of the returned pressmen was being carried to a pedantic length. Foreman compositors, advertisement clerks, and other members of the non-editorial staff, who had, of course, taken no part in the great trek, found it as impossible to get into direct communication with the editor and his satellites now that they had returned, as when they had been exclusively inaccessible in Central Asia. The sulky, overworked office boy, who was the one connecting link between the editorial brain and the business departments of the paper, sardonically explained the new aloofness as the Yarkand manor. Most of the reporters and sub-editors seemed to have been dismissed in autocratic fashion since their return, and new ones engaged by letter. To these, the editor and his immediate associates remained an unseen presence, issuing its instructions solely through the medium of curt type written notes. Something mystic and Tibetan and forbidden had replaced the human bustle and democratic simplicity of pre-migration days, and the same experience was encountered by those who made social overtures to the returned wanderers. The most brilliant hostess of the media, those who made social overtures to the returned wanderers. The most brilliant hostess of twentieth century London flung the pearl of her hospitality into the unresponsive trough of the editorial letterbox. It seemed as if nothing short of a royal command would drag the hermit's sole reverence from their self-imposed seclusion. People began to talk unkindly of the effect of high altitudes and eastern atmosphere on minds and temperaments unused to such luxuries. The Yarkand manner was not popular. And the contents of the paper, said the nephew, did they show the influence of the new style? Ah, said Zalalworth, that was the exciting thing. In home affairs, social questions and the ordinary events of the day not much change was noticeable. A certain oriental carelessness seemed to have crept into the editorial department and perhaps a note of lassitude, not unnatural in the work of men who had returned from what has been a fairly arduous journey. The aforetime standard of excellence was scarcely maintained, but at any rate the general lines of policy and outlook were not departed from. It was in the realm of foreign affairs that a startling change took place. Blunt, forcible, outspoken articles appeared, couched in language which nearly turned the autumn maneuvers of six important powers into mobilisations. Whatever else the Daily Intelligencer had learned in the East, it had not acquired the art of diplomatic ambiguity. The man in the street enjoyed the articles and bought the paper, as he had never bought it before. The man in Downing Street took a different view. The foreign secretary, Hildu, accounted a rather reticent man, became positively garrulous in the course of perpetually disavowing the sentiments expressed in the Daily Intelligence as leaders, and then one day the government came to a conclusion that something definite and drastic must be done. A deputation, consisting of the Prime Minister, the foreign secretary, of four leading financiers and a well-known nonconformist divine, made its way to the offices of the paper. At the door leading to the editorial department, the way was barred by a nervous but defiant office boy. You can't see the editor nor any of the staff, he announced. We insist on seeing the editor, or some responsible person, said the Prime Minister, and the deputation forced its way in. The boy had spoken truly. There was no one to be seen. In the whole suite of rooms there was no sign of human life. Where is the editor, or the foreign editor, or the chief leader-writer, or anybody? In answer to the shower of questions, the boy unlocked a drawer and produced a strange-looking envelope which bore a co-canned postmark and a date of some seven or eight months back. It contained a scrap of paper on which was written the following message. Entire party captured by brigand tribe on homeward journey. Quarter of a million demanded as ransom, but would probably take less. Inform government, relations, and friends. There followed the signatures of the principal members of the party and instructions as to how and where the money was to be paid. The letter had been directed to the office boy in charge, who had quietly suppressed it. No one is a hero to one's own office boy, and he evidently considered that a quarter of a million was an unwarrantable outlay for such a doubtfully advantageous object as the repatriation of an errant newspaper staff. So he drew the editorial and other salaries, forged what signatures were necessary, engaged new reporters, did what sub-editing he could, and made as much use as possible of the large accumulation of special articles that was held in reserve for emergencies. The articles on foreign affairs were entirely his own composition. Of course, the whole thing had to be kept as quiet as possible. An interim staff pledged a secrecy that was appointed to keep the paper going until the pining captives could be sought out, ransomed and brought home in twos and threes to escape notice, and gradually things were put back on their old footing. The articles on foreign affairs reverted to the won'ted traditions of the paper. But, in depose the nephew, how on earth did the boy account to the relatives all those months for the non-appearance that, said Salalworth, was the most brilliant stroke of all? To the wife or nearest relative of each of the missing men, he forwarded a letter, copying the handwriting of the supposed writer as well as he could and making excuses about vile pens and ink. In each letter he told the same story, varying only the locality, to the effect that the writer, alone of the whole party, was unable to tear himself away from the wild liberty and allurements of eastern life, and was going to spend several months roaming in some selected region. Many of the wives started off immediately in pursuit of their errant husbands, and it took the government a considerable time and much trouble to reclaim them from their fruitless quests along the banks of the Oxus, the Gobi Desert, the Orenburg Steppe, and other outlandish places. One of them, I believe, is still lost somewhere in the Tigris Valley. And the boy is still in journalism. End of The Yarkhand Manor The Byzantine Omelette From Beasts and Superbeasts by Saki This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information, or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org The Byzantine Omelette by Saki Sophie Chattelmunkheim was a socialist by conviction, and a Chattelmunkheim by marriage. The particular member of that wealthy family whom she had married was rich, even as his relatives counted riches. Sophie had very advanced and decided views as to the distribution of money. It was a pleasing and fortunate circumstance that she also had the money. When she invaded eloquently against the evils of capitalism at drawing-room meetings and Fabian conferences, she was conscious of a comfortable feeling that the system, with all its inequalities and inequities, would probably last her time. It is one of the consolations of middle-aged reformers that the good they inculcate must live after them, if it is to live at all. On a certain spring evening, somewhere towards the dinner hour, Sophie Chattelmunkheim sat tranquilly between her mirror and her maid, undergoing the process of having her hair built into an elaborate reflection of the prevailing fashion. She was hedged round with great peace. The peace of one who has attained a desired end with much effort and perseverance, and who has found it still eminently desirable in its attainment. The duke of Syria had consented to come beneath her roof as a guest, and was even now installed beneath her roof, and would shortly be sitting at her dining-table. As a good socialist, Sophie disapproved of social distinctions and derided the idea of a princely caste. But if there were to be these artificial gradations of rank and dignity, she was pleased and anxious to have an exalted specimen of an exalted order included in her house-party. She was broad-minded enough to love the sinner while hating the sin. Not that she entertained any warm feeling of personal affection for the duke of Syria, who was a comparative stranger, but still, as duke of Syria, he was very, very welcome beneath her roof. She could not have explained why, but no one was likely to ask her for an explanation, and most hostesses envied her. You must surpass yourself to-night, Richardson. She said complacently to her maid, I must be looking my very best. We must all surpass ourselves. The maid said nothing. But from the concentrated look in her eyes and the deft play of her fingers it was evident that she was beset with the ambition to surpass herself. A knock came at the door, a quiet but peremptory knock as of someone who would not be denied. Go and see who it is, Sotsofi. It may be something about the wine. Richardson held a hurried conference with an invisible messenger at the door. When she returned there was noticeable a curious listlessness in place of her hitherto alert manner. What is it? asked Sotsofi. The household servants had downed tools, madam, said Richardson. Downed tools, exclaimed Sotsofi. Do you mean to say they've gone on strike? Yes, madam, said Richardson, adding the information he is Kaspar that the troubles about. Kaspar, said Sotsofi, wonderingly, the emergency chef, the omelette specialist. Yes, madame. Before he became an omelette specialist, he was a valet, and he was one of the strike-breakers in the Great Strike at Lord Grimford's two years ago. As soon as the ice-hold staffier learned that you'd engaged him, they resolved downed tools as a protest. They haven't got any grievance against you personally, but they demand that Kaspar should be immediately dismissed. But, protested Sotsofi, he's the only man in England who understands how to make a Byzantine omelette. I engaged him specially for the Duke of Syria's visit, and it would be impossible to replace him at short notice. I should have to send to Paris, and the Duke loves Byzantine omelettes. It was the one thing we talked about coming from the station. He was one of the strike-breakers at Lord Grimford's, reiterated Richardson. This is too awful, said Sotsofi. A strike of servants at a moment like this, with the Duke of Syria staying in the house, something must be done immediately. Quick, finish my hair, and I'll go and see what I can do to bring them round. I can't finish your hair, madame," said Richardson quietly, but with immense decision. I belong to the Union, and I can't do another half-minute's work till the strike is settled. I'm sorry, a bit disobliging. But this is inhuman, exclaimed Sotsofi tragically. I've always been a model mistress, and I've refused to employ any but Union servants. This is the result. I can't finish my hair myself. I don't know how to. What am I to do? What am I to do? It's wicked." Wicked is the word, said Richardson. I'm a good conservative, and I have no patience with this socialist foolery, asking you pardon. It's tyranny, that's what it is, all along the line, but I have my living to make, same as other people, and I've got to belong to the Union. I couldn't touch another airpin without a strike permit, not if you was to double me wages. The door burst open, and Catherine Malsum raged into the room. Here's a nice affair, she screamed. A strike of household servants, without a moment's warning, and I'm left like this. I can't appear in public in this condition." After a very hasty scrutiny, Sotsofi assured her that she could not. Have they all struck? she asked her maid. Nor will the kitchen staff, said Richardson. They belong to a different Union. Dinner, at least, will be assured, said Sotsofi. That's something to be thankful for. Dinner, snorted Catherine, what on earth is the good of dinner, when none of us will be able to appear at it? Look at your hair, and look at me, or rather don't. I know it's difficult to manage without a maid. Can't your husband be any help to you? asked Sotsofi, despairingly. Henry, he's in worse case than any of us. His man is the only person who really understands that ridiculous newfangled Turkish bath that he insists on taking with him everywhere. Surely he could do without a Turkish bath one evening. I can't appear without hair, but a Turkish bath is a luxury. My good woman, said Catherine, speaking with a fearful intensity. Henry was in the bath when the strike started. In it, do you understand? He's there now. Can't he get out? He doesn't know how to. Every time he pulls the lever marked Release, he only releases hot steam. And there are two kinds of steam in the bath—bearable and scarcely bearable. He has released them both. By this time, I'm probably a widow. I simply can't send away Gaspar, wailed Sotsofi. I should never be able to secure another omelette specialist. Any difficulty that I may experience in securing another husband is, of course, a trifle beneath anyone's consideration. Said Catherine bitterly. Sotsofi capitulated. Go, she said to Richardson, and tell the strike committee, or whoever are directing this affair, that Gaspar is here with dismissed, and ask Gaspar to see me presently in the library, where I will pay him what is due to him, and make what excuses I can, and then fly back and finish my hair. Some half an hour later, Sotsofi marshaled her guests in the Grand Salon, preparatory to the formal march to the dining-room. Except that, Henry Malsum was of the ripe Raspberry Tint that one sometimes sees at private theatricals representing the human complexion, there was little outward sign among those assembled of the crisis that had just been encountered and surmounted. But the tension had been too stupefying while it lasted not to leave some mental effects behind it. Sotsofi talked at random to her illustrious guest, and found her eyes straying with increasing frequency towards the great doors through which would presently come the blessed announcement that dinner was served. Now and again she glanced mirror-wood at the reflection of her wonderfully quaffed hair, as an insurance underwriter might gaze thankfully at an overdue vessel that had ridden safely into harbour in the wake of a devastating hurricane. Then the doors opened, and the welcome figure of the butler entered the room. But he made no general announcement of a banquet in reddiness, and the doors closed behind him. His message was for Sotsofi alone. There is no dinner, madame," he said gravely. The kitchen staff have downed tools. Gaspar belongs to the Union of Cooks and Kitchen Employees, and as soon as they heard of his summary dismissal at a moment's notice they struck work. They demand his instant reinstatement and an apology to the Union. I may add, madame, that they are very firm. I have been obliged even to hand back the dinner-rolls that were already on the table. After the lapse of eighteen months, Sotsofi Chattelmunkheim is beginning to go about again among her old haunts and associates, but she still has to be very careful. The doctors will not let her attend anything at all exciting, such as a drawing-room meeting, or a Fabian conference. It is doubtful indeed whether she wants to end of the Byzantine omelette. The Feast of Nemesis From Beasts and Superbeasts by Sarki This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Feast of Nemesis by Sarki It is a good thing that St. Valentine's Day has dropped out of vogue, said Mrs. Thackenbury, what with Christmas, New Year and Easter, not to speak of birthdays, there are quite enough remembrance days as it is. I tried to save myself trouble at Christmas by just sending flowers to all my friends, but it wouldn't work. Gertrude has eleven hot houses and about thirty gardeners, so it would have been ridiculous to send flowers to her. And Millie has just started a florist's shop, so it was equally out of the question there. The stress of having to decide in a hurry what to give to Gertrude and Millie, just when I thought I had got the whole question nicely off my mind, completely ruined my Christmas, and then the awful monotony of the letters of thanks. Thank you so much for your lovely flowers. It was so good of you to think of me. Of course, in the majority of cases, I hadn't thought about the recipients at all, their names were down in my list of people who must not be left out. If I trusted to remembering them, there would be some awful sins of omission. The trouble is, said Clovis to his aunt, all these days of intrusive remembrance harps super-sistently on one aspect of human nature, and entirely ignore the other. That is why they become super-functional and artificial. At Christmas and New Year, you're emboldened and encouraged by convention to send gushing messages of optimistic goodwill and servile affection to people whom you would scarcely ask to lunch unless someone else had failed you at the last moment, if you were subbing at a restaurant on New Year's Eve, you are permitted and expected to join hands and sing for old Langsine, with strangers whom you've never seen before, and never want to see again. But no licence is allowing in the opposite direction. Opposite direction? What? Opposite direction? Queered Mrs. Thackenbury. There's no outlet for demonstrating your feelings towards people whom you simply love. That is really the crying need of our modern civilisation. Just think how jolly it would be if a recognised day were set apart for the paying off of old scores and grudges. A day when one could lay oneself out to be gracefully vindictive to a carefully treasured list of people who must not be let off. I remember when I was at private school we had one day, the last Monday of the term I think it was, consecrated to the settlement of feuds and grudges. Of course we didn't appreciate it as much as it deserved, because after all any day of the term could be used for that purpose. Still, if one had chastised a smaller boy for being cheeky weeks before, one was always permitted on that day to recall the episode to his memory by chastising him again. That is what the French call a reconstructing the crime. I should call it reconstructing the punishment, said Mrs. Secondbury, and anyhow I don't see how you could introduce a system of primitive school-boy vengeance into civilised adult life. We haven't type-grown our passions, but we are supposed to have learned how to keep them within strictly decorous limits. Of course the thing would have to be done furtively and politely, said Clovis. The charm of it would be that it would never be perfunctory, like the other thing. Now, for instance, you say to yourself, I must show the Webleys some attention at Christmas, they were kind to dear Bertie at Bournemouth, and you send them a calendar and daily for six days after Christmas. The male Webley asks the female Webley if she is remembered to thank you for the calendar you sent them. Well, tramps plant that idea to the other and more human side of your nature, and say to yourself, Next Thursday is Nemesis Day. What on earth can I do to those odious people next door, who made such an absurd fuss when Ping Yang bit their youngest child? Then you'd get up awfully early on the allotted day, and climb over into their garden, and dig for truffles on their tennis court with a good gardening fork, choosing, of course, that part of the court that was screened from observation by the Laurel Bushes. You wouldn't find any truffles, but you would find a great peace, such as no amount of present giving could ever bestow. I shouldn't, said Mrs. Thackenbry, though her air of protest sounded a bit forced. I should feel rather a worm for doing such a thing. You exaggerate the power of upheaval which a worm would be able to bring into play in the limited time available, said Clovis, if you put in a strenuous ten minutes with a really useful fork, the result ought to suggest to the operations of an unusually masterful mow, or a badger in a hurry. They might guess I had done it, said Mrs. Thackenbry. Of course they would, said Clovis, but that would be half the satisfaction of the thing, just as you like people at Christmas to know what presents or cards you've sent them. The thing would be much easier to manage, of course, when you were on outwardly friendly terms with the object of your dislike. That greedy little agnese Blake, for instance, who thinks of nothing but her food, it would be quite simple to ask her to a picnic in some wild woodland spot and lose her just before lunch was served, and when you found her again every morsel of food could have been eaten up. It would require no ordinary human strategy to lose agnese Blake when luncheon was imminent. In fact, I don't believe it could be done. Then have all the other guests, people whom you dislike, and lose the luncheon. It could have been sent by accident in the wrong direction. It would be a ghastly picnic, said Mrs. Thackenbury. Oh, for them, but not for you, said Clovis. You would have had an early and comforting lunch before you started, and you could improve the occasion by mentioning in detail some of the items of the missing banquet. The lobster new-berg, and the egg mayonnaise, and the curry that was to have been heated in a chafing-dish. Agnese Blake could be delirious long before you got to the list of wines, and in the long interval of waiting before they had quite a abandoned hope of the lunch turning up, you could induce them to play silly games, such as that idiotic one of the Lord Mayor's dinner party, in which everyone has to choose the name of a dish and do something futile when it's called out. In this case, they would probably burst into tears when their dish is mentioned. It would be a heavenly picnic. Mrs. Thackenbury was silent for a moment. She was probably making a mental list of the people she would like to invite to the Ducumfrey picnic. Presently she asked, And that odious young man, Waldo Plubbly, who's always coddling himself, have you thought of anything that one could do to him? Evidently she was beginning to see the possibilities of Nemesis Day. If there was anything like a general observance of the festival, said Clovis, Waldo had been such demand that you'd have to be speaking weeks beforehand, and even then, if there were an east wind blowing or a cloud or two in the sky, he might be too careful of his precious self to come out. It would be rather jolly if you could lure him into a hammock in the orchard, just near the spot where there's wasps nest every summer. A comfortable hammock on a warm afternoon would appeal to his indolent tastes, and then, when he was getting drowsy, a lighted fusee thrown into the nest would bring the wasps out in an indignant mass, and they would soon find a home away from home on Waldo's fat body. It takes some doing to get out of a hammock in a hurry. They might sting him to death, protested Mrs. Thackenbury. Waldo is one of those people who would be enormously improved by death, said Clovis, but if you don't want to go as far as that, you could have some wet straw rated hand, and set it a light under the hammock at the same time as the fusee was thrown into the nest. The smoke would keep all but the most militant of the wasps just outside the stinging line, and as long as Waldo remained within its protection he would escape serious damage, and could be eventually restored to his mother, kippered all over and swollen in places but still perfectly recognisable. His mother would be my enemy for life, said Mrs. Thackenbury. That would be one less greeting to exchange at Christmas, said Clovis. End of The Feast of Nemesis