She was talking to him in just that fashion now. He had slipped upstairs, attracted by a smell in the dining-room. Watching for the moment when he would be undetected, he had crept round the dining-room door and had stood, his nose in air, surrounded by a sea of worn green carpet, sniffing. Suddenly he felt a hand on his collar and there followed that voice that of all others he most detested. “Why, here’s Hamlet! Helen, here’s Hamlet! . . . We can get him ready now, Helen; there’s only two hours left anyway, and Jeremy will care much more about that than anything. I’d like to leave him downstairs, but Jeremy will be sure to ask where he is. Which colour shall I use for the ribbon, Helen? I’ve got blue and red and orange.” A pause. Then again: “Which shall I use? Do say.” Then from a great distance: “Oh, don’t bother, Mary. Can’t you see I’m busy?” A heavy sigh. “Oh, well, you might. Never mind. I think the blue’s best.” All this time Hamlet was desperately wriggling, but the hand, with knuckles that pressed into the flesh and hurt, had firm hold. “Oh, do keep still, Hamlet. Can’t you see that your master’s coming home and you’ve got to be made nice? Oh, bother! I’ve gone and cut the piece too short. . . . Helen, have you got another piece of blue?” A pause. Then again: “Oh, Helen, you might say. I’ve cut the piece too short. Haven’t you got another bit of blue?” Then again from a long distance: “Don’t _bother_, Mary. Can’t you _see_ that I’m so busy?” “Oh, very well, then.” A terribly deep sigh that made Hamlet shiver with discomfort. “Come here, Hamlet. On to my lap, where I can tie it better. There, that’s right. Oh, _do_ keep your head still—and how fat you are now!” Insult upon insult heaped. He raised his eyes to heaven, partly in indignation, partly because the entrancing smell could be caught more securely now from the elevation of Mary’s lap! But the discomfort of that lap, the hard boniness, the sudden precipitate valley, the shortness of its surface so that one was for ever slipping two legs over, the moist warmth of the surrounding hand, the iron hardness of the fingers at the neck! He played his best game of wriggle, slipping, sliding, lying suddenly inert, jerking first with his paws, then with his hind legs, digging his head beneath his captor’s arm as the flamingo did in “Alice.” Mary, as so often occurred, lost her patience. “Oh, do keep still, Hamlet! How tiresome you are, when I’ve got such a little time too! Don’t you like to have a ribbon? And you’ll have to be brushed too. Helen, where’s the brush that we used to have for Hamlet?” No answer. “Oh, do keep still, you naughty dog!” She dug her knuckles into his eyes. “Oh, Helen, do say! Don’t you know where it is?” Then from a great distance: “Oh, don’t bother, Mary. No, I don’t know where it is. How stupid you are! Can’t you see I’m busy?” He wriggled, Mary slapped him. He turned and bit her. She dropped him. “Oh, Helen, he’s bit me!”