“Always seems a bit dim,” said the Boots, putting down the bag and jerking at the blind cord. “There, sir, that’s a little better.” Mr. Partridge changed quickly into his golf attire and went down to lunch. Afterwards they took sides in the traditional four-ball match which inaugurated these reunions. The play was not of a very par standard, and the balls were slyly provocative in concealing themselves, so that it was growing dusk as they entered the little garden of the Hotel. As they came through the gate Willie Cranmer said to Mr. Partridge, “Got a decent room, Jim?” “No,” said the latter. “Dark and poky, but it will do all right. It’s that one, I think, next to the chimney, with the small window.” “Well,” said Willie, “there’s someone in there, I saw him look out for a moment.” Mr. Partridge stared up for a moment. “Probably the Boots,” he said, a little shortly. When he went up to dress for dinner, he found his distaste for Number 39 decidedly intensified. He went to the window and looked out. Yes, it _was_ the one next to the chimney. He could find no trace of any activity by the Boots. In fact, there was too little activity on the part of everybody in this rotten place--no hot water, for example. He’d let his ancient friend Armitage know what he thought of R.A.C. recommended Hotels! He rang the bell viciously, which presently resulted in a timid knock--a maid with a japanned tin can--who came in with the expression of a heifer facing the pole-axe, hurried across the room, rattled down the can in the basin, and ran out again. “Do I look as great a menace to rustic virtue as all that?” wondered Mr. Partridge. “I should like to think so, but I don’t.” And he set himself to a smart piece of changing. During dinner the conversation took the natural form of a riot of golf-shop--the usual immortality for green-finders, the usual Nirvana for shanks, tops and flubs, but afterwards in the lounge they turned to less momentous topics. For example, Mr. Partridge asked Willie Cranmer if he had secured any notable prizes in the book-market lately. “Nothing of any great value,” he replied, “but one thing which interests me very much. It’s a privately printed--very badly printed--account of some troublesome events in an Essex Manor, dated 1754. Its abominable title page is inscribed as follows: THE HAUNTINGE OF MY HOUSE BY CHAS. SWINTON A GENTLEMAN OF ESSEX. “He seems to have inherited the place in 1750, but his joy at such good fortune speedily turned to foreboding and exasperation. He goes into great detail, and certainly Swinton Manor seems to have housed a disturbing company. He must have had his fair share of guts and pertinacity to have stuck it as long as he did. It’s the most curious chronicle of its kind I ever read. Eventually he had the house pulled down, having endured enough.”