bages
and things. Not much! I've been relying on this show ever since Berry
trod on the big marrow."

"Well, of course, there is Buckingham," said Berry.

"Or the soothsayer," said Jill.

"You are now talking," I said. "Soothsaying is one of my fortes--my
Martello tower, in fact. Of course, Hurlingham--"

"Buckingham, stupid!"

"Well, Buckingham, then, has his points. Whom does he espouse?"

"He doesn't espouse anyone."

"Whom does he love, then?"

Berry and Daphne looked uneasily at one another. I turned to Jonah,
who was deep in The Sportsman.

"Who's Buckingham in love with, Jonah"

"Down and four to play. What?" said that worthy.

"Oh, Buckingham? He's hanging round the Queen mostly, I think, but
he's got two or three other irons in the fire."

"I will play Hurl--Buckingham," said I.

When Berry had finished, I reminded him that he had suggested the part,
and that my mind was made up.

After a lengthy argument, in the course of which Berry drew a stage on
the table-cloth to show why it was I couldn't act:

"Oh, well, I suppose he'd better play it," said Daphne: "but I scent
trouble."

"That's right," I said. "Let me have a copy of the play."

Berry rose and walked towards the door. With his fingers on the
handle, he turned.

"If you don't know what some of the hard words mean," he said, "I shall
be in the library."

"Why in the library?" said Daphne.

"I'm going to write in another scene."

"Another scene?"

"Well, an epilogue, then."

"What's it going to be?"

"Buckingham's murder," said Berry. "I can see it all. It will be
hideously realistic. All women and children will have to leave the
theatre."

As he went out:

"I expect the Duke will fight desperately," said I.

Berry put his head round the door.

"No," he said, "that's the dastardly part of it. It is from behind
that his brains are dashed out with a club."

I stretched out my hand for a roll.

"Do you know how a log falls?" said Berry. "Because, if--"

I could not get Daphne to see that, if Berry had not withdrawn his
head, the roll would not have hit the Sargent. However.

The good works of which Daphne is sometimes full occasionally overflow
and deluge those in her immediate vicinity. Very well, then. A local
institution, whose particular function has for the moment escaped me,
suddenly required funds. Perhaps I should say that it was suddenly
noised abroad that this was the case, for it was