d 'ave up the champagne when 'e sees
us. Maybe on the other 'and--'e won't. Maybe 'e'll be dead when we goes
away. Maybe not. But we've got to see 'im. Now as you know, 'e shuts
'isself up and never opens the door to a soul; only you don't know why
and we does. The only one as can ever get at 'im is 'is mother.
Well, it's a confounded funny coincidence,' he said, accenting the
penultimate, 'it's a very unusual piece of good luck, but you're 'is
mother.'

"'When first I saw 'er picture,' said the man Bill, shaking his head in
a ruminant manner, 'when I first saw it I said--old Shorter. Those were
my exact words--old Shorter.'

"'What do you mean, you wild creatures?' I gasped. 'What am I to do?'

"'That's easy said, your 'oldness,' said the man with the revolver,
good-humouredly; 'you've got to put on those clothes,' and he pointed to
a poke-bonnet and a heap of female clothes in the corner of the room.

"I will not dwell, Mr Swinburne, upon the details of what followed. I
had no choice. I could not fight five men, to say nothing of a loaded
pistol. In five minutes, sir, the Vicar of Chuntsey was dressed as an
old woman--as somebody else's mother, if you please--and was dragged out
of the house to take part in a crime.

"It was already late in the afternoon, and the nights of winter were
closing in fast. On a dark road, in a blowing wind, we set out towards
the lonely house of Colonel Hawker, perhaps the queerest cortege that
ever straggled up that or any other road. To every human eye, in every
external, we were six very respectable old ladies of small means, in
black dresses and refined but antiquated bonnets; and we were really
five criminals and a clergyman.

"I will cut a long story short. My brain was whirling like a windmill as
I walked, trying to think of some manner of escape. To cry out, so long
as we were far from houses, would be suicidal, for it would be easy for
the ruffians to knife me or to gag me and fling me into a ditch. On the
other hand, to attempt to stop strangers and explain the situation was
impossible, because of the frantic folly of the situation itself. Long
before I had persuaded the chance postman or carrier of so absurd a
story, my companions would certainly have got off themselves, and in all
probability would have carried me off, as a friend of theirs who had
the misfortune to be mad or drunk. The last thought, however, was an
inspiration; though a very terrible one. Had it come to