I could read no more. The _Sportsman_ dropped from my unheeding hands, and I had just begun to whistle the opening bars of the “Dead March,” when two brown boots and the lower parts of a pair of grey flannel trousers wriggled from the lawn through the open window. They were surmounted two seconds later by a straw hat, a straw-coloured moustache, and an aquiline nose, which I identified as belonging to the General Nuisance. He had an exquisitely neat brown paper parcel under his arm, and a smile of fifty candle-power illuminating his classic features. I was horrified to see it. “You’re early this morning,” I said resignedly. “It wants a quarter to eight yet. Have some breakfast?” “Tha-anks,” he drawled, “but I’ve had my milk. I’ve called round to bring you yours.” As he spoke he removed the string from the parcel in the most leisurely manner and disclosed a pile of carefully folded newspapers with names pencilled on the corners. Having discovered mine, he handed it to me with that air of benevolent condescension that head masters wear on speech day. “How nice of you!” I said. However, I’m afraid this irony was so delicate that he didn’t feel it. “My dear fellow, not at all,” he said. “There’s one for everybody. I’m delivering ’em to the whole team, don’t you know.” Needless to say, he had presented me with an immaculate copy of the _Sportsman_. I picked up my own discarded sheet from under the table. “Awf’ly obliged, old chap, but I’ve got one, thank you,” I said, pleasantly. “That’s lucky,” said he, “you can give one to your friends. Rather pretty reading, isn’t it? Awf’ly decent set, Trenthams, Elphinstone, etcetera.” “Git!” I said, gazing round for a boot-jack or a poker, or something equally likely to debase his physical beauty. “Ta-ta then, see you later!” To my infinite joy he appeared to be taking the hint. But he had only just conducted his infernal smile to the right side of the window, when he jerked it back again, and said:-- “Oh, I forgot! I say, Dimsdale, I ought to tell you this. I rather think Billy _was_ drunk last night. His eyes are as red as a ferret’s this morning, and his housekeeper told me in confidence that when she got up this morning and went to call him she found master’s umbrella in bed and master sleeping in the umbrella-stand.” “No, don’t say that,” I gasped, with a sinking at the heart. Alas! we’d only got two bowlers, and Billy was the one on whom we depended most.