Wiggie pondered, expecting every minute to see the watchdogs round the corner, and felt again that frivolous longing for a last snap of the fingers in the relentless face of Fate. He had been a keen player in his early twenties, before the Moloch of music clasped him in its searing arms. There had even been international visions, at one time. It would be rather fun to feel the ugly old stick again, jumping and ready under his hand, to put out a foot in the path of the whizzing ball and nurse it neatly up the hugged touch-line. Of course, he couldn’t possibly last more than five minutes, and Harriet would be extremely angry if he went and died suddenly in front of a clean clearing-shot, but he wanted those five minutes very badly. Moreover, for some curious reason, he had never been able to disobey Harriet’s mandates. He did things for Dandy because it was as natural as eating and sleeping, not in the least because he felt he had to; but he was always conscious that Harriet was pushing him, and he seldom tried to resist, for, deep down somewhere in his drifting soul, was a queer sense of comfort in being pushed. “Togs?” he asked weakly, and Harriet’s face brightened. “Oh, Lanty will rig you out! He’s got all the necessary kit stowed away somewhere, if Helwise hasn’t shifted it to the nearest rummage-sale. I’ll tell him you’ll send over for it in the morning, if you don’t see him yourself. I say--it’s jolly decent of you! Hope you don’t really mind missing the old ’buses? It makes all the difference to _me_; and the fresh air will do you no end of good--you take my word for it!--that, and a bit of hopping about. D’you suppose those friends of yours are still kicking their heels? Perhaps they’re wanting to cocker you about the hammer-yell. Oughtn’t you to be scouting round?” “They’re not friends,” Wiggie answered absently--he was trying to remember that neat little twist of the stick-point that had been such a favourite of his--“they’re police. At least, I mean----” He stammered, catching her surprised eye. “I say, my head is really rather bad! I think I’ll take the path across the fields, and miss everybody. You might shunt the--the friends for me, captain, and whisper a word in Hamer’s ear!” “Right-o!” She swerved off with a nod as he opened the little gate and fled across the green to the stile in the opposite wall. There he heard her hail him a second time, just as he was stepping into safety. “You know where the ground is, I suppose? The big meadow just below Wild Duck. Don’t forget. Bully-off at 2.30, _sharp_!” He stood a moment with a foot on the hollowed stone. The feel of the farm came back to him, and the rocker, and the furry cat. He was glad the ground was just there--wherever it was. If he might not live at Wild Duck, he might at least, when the match was over, go and die in it.