ugh and Mrs Brindley. It was just as if
I had known them for years.

'You'll make a mess of that, Ol,' said Mr Brindley.

The other two men were at some distance, in front of a table, on which
were two champagne bottles and five glasses, and a plate of cakes.
'Well,' I said to myself, 'I'm not going to have any champagne, anyhow.
Mercurey! Green Chartreuse! Irish whisky! And then champagne! And a
morning's hard work tomorrow! No!'

Plop! A cork flew up and bounced against the ceiling.

Mr Colclough carefully emptied the bottle into the glasses, of which Mr
Brindley seized two and advanced with one in either hand for the women.
It was the host who offered a glass to me.

'No, thanks very much, I really can't,' I said in a very firm tone.

My tone was so firm that it startled them. They glanced at each other
with alarmed eyes, like simple people confronted by an inexplicable
phenomenon. 'But look here, mister!' said Mr Colclough, pained, 'we've
got this out specially for you. You don't suppose this is our usual
tipple, do you?'

I yielded. I could do no less than sacrifice myself to their enchanting
instinctive kindness of heart. 'I shall be dead tomorrow,' I said to
myself; 'but I shall have lived tonight.' They were relieved, but I saw
that I had given them a shock from which they could not instantaneously
recover. Therefore I began with a long pull, to reassure them.

'Mrs Brindley has been telling me that Simon Fuge is dead,' said Mrs
Colclough brightly, as though Mrs Brindley had been telling her that
the price of mutton had gone down.

I perceived that those two had been talking over Simon Fuge, after
their fashion.

'Oh yes,' I responded.

'Have you got that newspaper in your pocket, Mr Loring?' asked Mrs
Brindley.

I had.

'No,' I said, feeling in my pockets; 'I must have left it at your
house.'

'Well,' she said, 'that's strange. I looked for it to show it to Mrs
Colclough, but I couldn't see it.'

This was not surprising. I did not want Mrs Colclough to read the
journalistic obituary until she had given me her own obituary of Fuge.

'It must be somewhere about,' I said; and to Mrs Colclough: 'I suppose
you knew him pretty well?'

'Oh, bless you, no! I only met him once.'

'At Ilam?'

'Yes. What are you going to do, Oliver?'

Her husband was opening the piano.

'Bob and I are just going to have another smack at that Brahms.'

'You don't expect us to listen, do you?'

'I expect you