elia came back with flannels and things and washed Jumbo's face.

"There!" she said. "Now his mother would love him again." Very
confidently she propelled his trunk against his chin and added, "Come
in."

"You can hear it quite plainly," I said quickly.

"It doesn't re--rever--reverberate--is that the word?" said Celia, "but
it's quite a distinctive noise. I'm sure you'd hear it."

"I'm sure I should. Let's try."

"Not now. I'll try later on, when you aren't expecting it. Besides, you
must begin your work. Good-bye. Work hard." She pushed me in and shut
the door.

I began to work.

I work best on the sofa; I think most clearly in what appears to the
hasty observer to be an attitude of rest. But I am not sure that Celia
really understands this yet. Accordingly, when a knock comes at the door
I jump to my feet, ruffle my hair, and stride up and down the room with
one hand on my brow. "Come in," I call impatiently, and Celia finds me
absolutely in the throes. If there should chance to be a second knock
later on, I make a sprint for the writing-desk, seize pen and paper,
upset the ink or not as it happens, and present to any one coming in at
the door the most thoroughly engrossed back in London.

But that was in the good old days of knuckle-knocking. On this
particular morning I had hardly written more than a couple of thousand
words--I mean I had hardly got the cushions at the back of my head
comfortably settled when Celia came in.

"Well?" she said eagerly.

I struggled out of the sofa.

"What is it?" I asked sternly.

"Did you hear it all right?"

"I didn't hear anything."

"Oh!" she said in great disappointment. "But perhaps you were asleep,"
she went on hopefully.

"Certainly not. I was working."

"Did I interrupt you?"

"You did rather; but it doesn't matter."

"Oh, well, I won't do it again--unless I really have to. Good-bye, and
good luck."

She went out and I returned to my sofa. After an hour or so my mind
began to get to work, and I got up and walked slowly up and down the
room. The gentle exercise seemed to stimulate me. Seeing my new putter
in the corner of the room, I took it up (my brain full of other things)
and, dropping a golf ball on the carpet, began to practise. After five
or ten minutes, my ideas being now quite clear, I was just about to
substitute the pen for the putter when Celia came in.

"Oh!" she said. "Are--are you busy?"

I turned round from a difficult putt with th