ut--"

"John, calm yourself," said Cecilia crushingly. "Alan, tell me what you've
been doing."

"Yes," muttered John, "tell her." He subsided into an armchair.

"Well," I said, "you see, Christopher and I were up in the nursery and
getting on quite all right when John butted in--"

"I simply opened--"

"John, keep quiet," said his wife. "Well, Alan?"

"Well, the fact is, Chris and I were in the middle of a great war with all
his soldiers. I had just firmly established fire superiority and was
actually on the verge of launching a huge offensive--the one that was going
to win the war, in fact--when, as I said, in butted this great clumsy
elephant and knocked half of Christopher's army over."

"Purely an accident," said John.

"_Will_ you keep quiet, or must I make you?" asked Cecilia.

"Well, of course," I went on, "finding ourselves suddenly attacked by a
common foe, Chris and I naturally joined forces to defend ourselves."

"Defend!--" shrieked John. "No, I won't keep quiet another second. Defend!
Why, they rushed at me like a couple of wild hyenas."

"My dear John," said Cecilia, "_you_ attacked them first, and of course
they defended themselves as best they could."

"Precisely," I said.

"After all, John," said Cecilia, "you ought to be glad your son is so ready
to look after himself, instead of calling him a hooligan. You're always
shouting about the noble art of self-defence."

"Noble art of self-defence _rot_," said John. "There's nothing in the noble
art about pushing lead soldiers down a man's neck."

"Down your neck?" said Cecilia.

"Yes," said John. "I keep trying to tell you and you won't let me. That
brute sat on the small of my back while Christopher pushed 'em down. The
little beasts all had their bayonets fixed, too."

Cecilia and I laughed.

"Yes, laugh," said John bitterly. "It _is_ funny that our child should be
growing up a Bolshevist; trying to flay his own father. He'll be setting
fire to the cat in a week and then you'll have another laugh."

"John," shrieked Cecilia, "how dare you? If you say another word about the
darling--"

The door opened and Christopher came into the room.

He seemed to have washed his face or something. Anyway, he looked quite a
little angel and that's hardly--however.

"I shall tell Chris what you've been saying," said Cecilia.

John jumped.

"No, no, Cecilia," he said in a strangled voice. "Don't betray me. I--I'm
sorry; I withdraw everything.