The chemist-assistant puppy looked him up and down with a small grin as if to say, “Law-lummy, what a sight of a human scare-crow!” Somers looked him back again, under lowered lids, and the puppy left off joking for the moment. He told Somers to take up other attitudes. Then he came forward close to him, right till their bodies almost touched, the one in a navy blue serge, holding back a little as if from the contagion of the naked one. He put his hand between Somers’ legs, and pressed it upwards, under the genitals. Somers felt his eyes going black. “Cough,” said the puppy. He coughed. “Again,” said the puppy. He made a noise in his throat, then turned aside in disgust. “Turn round,” said the puppy. “Face the other way.” Somers turned and faced the shameful monkey-faces at the long table. So, he had his back to the tall window: and the puppy stood plumb behind him. “Put your feet apart.” He put his feet apart. “Bend forward--further--further--” Somers bent forward, lower, and realised that the puppy was standing aloof behind him to look into his anus. And that this was the source of the wonderful jesting that went on all the time. “That will do. Get your jacket and go over there.” Somers put on his jacket and went and sat on the form that was placed endwise at the side of the fire, facing the side of the judgment table. The big, gaunt collier was still being fooled. He apparently was not very intelligent, and didn’t know what they meant when they told him to bend forward. Instead of bending with stiff knees--not knowing at all what they wanted--he crouched down, squatting on his heels as colliers do. And the doctor puppy, amid the hugest amusement, had to start him over again. So the game went on, and Somers watched them all. The collier was terrible to him. He had a sort of Irish face with a short nose and a thin black head. This snub-nose face had gone quite blank with a ghastly voidness, void of intelligence, bewildered and blind. It was as if the big, ugly, powerful body could not _obey_ words any more. Oh God, such an ugly body--not as if it belonged to a living creature. Somers kept himself hard and in command, face set, eyes watchful. He felt his cup had been filled now. He watched these buffoons in this great room, as he sat there naked save for his jacket, and he felt that from his heart, from his spine went out vibrations that should annihilate them--blot them out, the _canaille_, stamp them into the mud they belonged to. He was called at length to the table. “What is your name?” asked one of the old parties. Somers looked at him. “Somers,” he said, in a very low tone. “Somers--Richard Lovat?” with an indescribable sneer. Richard Lovat realised that they had got their knife into him. So! He had his knife in them, and it would strike deeper at last. “You describe yourself as a writer.” He did not answer. “A writer of what?”--with a perfect sneer. “Books--essays.”