He had just got as far as that bit about " The night is dark " and seemed to be going strong, though a little uncertain in the lower register, when he suddenly broke off. And the next thing I heard was a most frightful outbreak of shoutings and clumping and hangings. What had set him off, I could not, of course, say ; but the sounds left little room for doubt that for some reason or other the fellow had abruptly returned to what I might call the carving-knife phase. One of the advantages of being in the country, if you belong, like Brinkley, to the more aggressive type of loony, is that you have great freedom of movement. The sort of row he was making now, if made in, let us say, Grosvenor Square or Cadogan Terrace, would infallibly have produced posses of policemen within the first two minutes. Windows would have been raised, whistles blown. But in the peaceful seclusion of the Dower House, Chuffnell Regis, he was granted the widest scope for self-expression. Except for the Hall, there wasn't another house within a mile : and even the Hall was too far away for the ghastly uproar he was making to be more than a faint murmur. As to what he thought he was chasing, there again one could make no certain pronouncement. It? might be that the gardener-caretaker had not gone to the village, after all, and was
now wishing that he had. Or it might be, of course, that a fellow in Brinkley's sozzled condition did not require a definite object of the chase, but simply chased rainbows, so to speak, for the sake of the exercise. I was inclining to this latter view, and wondering a little wistfully if there mightn't be a chance of him falling downstairs and breaking his neck, when I found that I had been wrong. For some minutes the noise had grown somewhat fainter, activities seeming to have shifted to some distant part of the house; but now it suddenly hotted up again.
I heard feet clattering downstairs. Then there was a terrific crash. And immediately after that the back door was burst open, and out shot a human form. It whizzed rapidly in my direction. tripped over something, and came a purler almost at my feet. And I was about to commend my soul to God and jump on its gizzard, hoping for the best, when something in the tone of the comments it was making-a sort of educated profanity which seemed to give evidence of a better bringing-up than Brinkley could possibly have had-made me pause. I bent down. My diagnosis had been correct. It was Sir Roderick Glossop. I was just going to introduce myself and institute inquiries, when the back door swung open again and another figure appeared. " And stay out! " it observed, with a good deal of bitterness. The voice was Brinkley's. It was some small pleasure to me at a none too festive time to note that he was rubbing his left shin. The door slammed, and I heard the bolts shot. The next moment, a tenor voice rendering " Rock of Ages " showed that, as far as Brinkley was concerned, the episode was concluded. Sir Roderick had scrambled to his feet, and was standing puffing a good bit, as if touched in the wind. I was not surprised, for the going had been fast.
It struck me as a good moment to start the dialogue. " What ho, what ho I " I said. It seemed to be rather my fate on this particularnight to stir up my fellow man, not to mention my fellow scullery maid. But, judging by results, the magnetic force of my personality appeared to be a bit on the wane. I mean to say, while the scullerymaid had had hysterics and Chuff y had jumped a foot, this Glossop merely quivered like something in aspic when joggled on the dish. But this, of course, may have been becausethat was all he was physically able to do. These breathers with Brinkley take it out of a man. " It's all right," I continued, anxious to set him at his ease and remove the impression that what was murmuring in his ear was some fearful creature of the night. "
Only B. Wooster--" " Mr. Wooster I " " Absolutely." " Good God! " he said, becoming a little
more tranquil, though still far from the life and soul of the party. "
