cinate him; play him that little thing on the piano--you
know, 'Tum-ti-tum'--while I slope off to the secret chamber, where my
ancestor lay hid before--I mean after--the Battle of Worcester. By the
way, I hope it's been dusted lately? Hush! if he sees us hold secret
parlance I'm lost."

"Alas!" said my wife, "the secret chamber is where we keep the jam."

She smiled subtly at me and then winningly at the inspector as she
turned towards him.

"Step this way, please," she continued.

I caught the idea at once and, blessing the quick wit of woman,
followed in the victim's wake, ready to close the secret panel behind
him and leave him to a lingering death.

My wife slid open the trap, turning with a triumphant smile as she did
so, and I saw at once that the death of anyone shut up inside would be
a lot more lingering than I had imagined, for the place seemed full of
jam. I was surprised.

"Can I be going to eat all that?" I thought; and life seemed suddenly
a very beautiful thing.

The inspector ran a hungry eye over it all, and if he had tried to
clamber inside for a closer inspection I should not have given him the
quick push I had planned. I should have held him back by his coat. My
own way of testing the amount of jam which my wife had made was not
for the likes of him.

"About a hundred-and-fifty pounds," he said at last.

"Just a little over," nodded my wife.

"I tell you," I whispered, "this chap knows everything." Then aloud,
"I say, Sir, if you wouldn't mind putting me on to something for the
Cotsall Selling Plate. Simply," I added hastily, "in the national
interest, of course. Keeping up the breed of horses."

The inspector changed the subject again. "You were allocated one
hundredweight of sugar, I believe, Ma'am," he said.

"Oh, yes," replied my wife. "But you see some of our jam is still
sticking to the trees. Perhaps this gentleman would like to see the
orchard, Wenceslaus," she added, turning to me.

(Of course, you know, my Christian name isn't really Wenceslaus, but
we authors enjoy so little privacy nowadays that I must really be
allowed to leave it at that.)

So I took the inspector off to see the orchard, pausing on the way at
the strawberry bed.

"This," I explained, "was to have made up quite fifty pounds of our
allocation, but I'm afraid the crop failed this year. So that must
account for any little discrepancy in the weight of fruit." I was very
firm about this.

"Strawberries h