Tumpany was a shortish thick-set man of fifty, with a red clean-shaven face. He walked with his body bent forward, his arms hanging at his sides, and always seemed about to break into a short run. It was five years since he had retired even from the coast-guard, but Royal Navy was written large all over him, and would be until he tossed off his last pint of beer and sailed away to Fidler's Green--"Nine miles to windward of Hell," as he loved to explain to the housemaid and the cook. Tumpany's wife kept a small shop in the village, and he himself did the boots and knives, cleaned Gilbert's guns and went wild-fowling with him in the winter, was the more immediate Providence of the Dog Trust, and generally a most important and trusted person in the little household of the Poet. There was an almost exaggerated briskness in Tumpany's walk and manner as he turned into the kitchen. Blanche, the housemaid, was now "doing" the dining-room, in the interior of the house, but Phoebe, the cook--a stalwart lass of three and twenty--had just got the fire to her liking and was giving a finishing touch of polish to the range. "Morning, my girl!" said Tumpany in a bluff, cheery voice. Phoebe did not answer, but went on polishing the handle of the oven door. He repeated the salutation, a shade less confidently. The girl gave a final leisurely twist of the leather, surveyed her work critically for a moment, and then rose to her feet. "There are them knives," she said shortly, pointing to a basket upon the table, "and the boots is in the back kitchen." "You needn't be so short with a man, Phoebe." "You needn't have been so beastly drunk last night. Then them knives wouldn't want doing this morning. If it hadn't been for me the dog wouldn't have had no food. If the mistress knew she would have given you what for, as I expect your missis have already if the truth were known." "Damn the mistress!" said Tumpany. He adored Mary Lothian, as Phoebe very well knew, but his head burned and he was in the uncertain temper of the "morning after." The need of self-assertion was paramount. "Now, no beastly language in my kitchen," said the girl. "You go and do your damning--and them knives--in the outhouse. I wonder you've the face to come here at all, Master being away too. Get out, do!" With a very red and sulky face, Tumpany gathered up the knives and shambled away to his own particular sanctum. The ex-sailor was confused in his mind. There was a buzzing in his head like that of bees in a hive. He had a faint recollection of being turned out of the Mortland Arms just before ten o'clock the night before. His muddy memories showed him the stern judicial face of the rather grim old lady who kept the Inn. He seemed to feel her firm hands upon his shoulders yet.