nd watched them.

There seemed to have been trouble already. Looking more closely, I
perceived sitting on the grass apart a second young man. His face was
obscured by a dirty pocket handkerchief, with which he dabbed tenderly
at his features. Every now and then the shirt-sleeved young man flung
his hand towards him with an indignant gesture, talking hard the while.
It did not need a preternaturally keen observer to deduce what had
happened. Beale must have fallen out with the young man who was sitting
on the grass and smitten him; and now his friend had taken up the
quarrel.

"Now this," I said to myself, "is rather interesting. Here, in this one
farm, we have the only three known methods of dealing with duns. Beale
is evidently an exponent of the violent method. Ukridge is an apostle
of Evasion. I shall try Conciliation. I wonder which of us will be the
most successful."

Meanwhile, not to spoil Beale's efforts by allowing him too little
scope for experiment, I refrained from making my presence known, and
continued to stand by the gate, an interested spectator.

Things were evidently moving now. The young man's gestures became more
vigorous. The dogged look on Beale's face deepened. The comments of the
Ring increased in point and pungency.

"What did you hit him for, then?"

The question was put, always the same words and with the same air of
quiet triumph, at intervals of thirty seconds by a little man in a
snuff-coloured suit with a purple tie. Nobody ever answered him, or
appeared to listen to him, but he seemed each time to think that he had
clinched the matter and cornered his opponent.

Other voices chimed in.

"You hit him, Charlie. Go on. You hit him."

"We'll have the law."

"Go on, Charlie."

Flushed with the favour of the many-headed, Charlie now proceeded from
threats to action. His right fist swung round suddenly. But Beale was
on the alert. He ducked sharply, and the next moment Charlie was
sitting on the ground beside his fallen friend. A hush fell on the
Ring, and the little man in the purple tie was left repeating his
formula without support.

I advanced. It seemed to me that the time had come to be conciliatory.
Charlie was struggling to his feet, obviously anxious for a second
round, and Beale was getting into position once more. In another five
minutes conciliation would be out of the question.

"What's all this?" I said.

I may mention here that I do not propose to inflict dialec