ion. I was filled with a horrid fear that I was boring her. I
had probably arrived at the very moment when she was most interested in
her book. She must, I thought, even now be regarding me as a nuisance,
and was probably rehearsing bitter things to say to the maid for not
having had the sense to explain that she was out.

"I--er--called in the hope of seeing Professor Derrick," I said.

"You would find him on the links," she replied. It seemed to me that
she spoke wistfully.

"Oh, it--it doesn't matter," I said. "It wasn't anything important."

This was true. If the professor had appeared then and there, I should
have found it difficult to think of anything to say to him which would
have accounted to any extent for my anxiety to see him.

"How are the chickens, Mr. Garnet?" said she.

The situation was saved. Conversationally, I am like a clockwork toy. I
have to be set going. On the affairs of the farm I could speak
fluently. I sketched for her the progress we had made since her visit.
I was humorous concerning roop, epigrammatic on the subject of the
Hired Retainer and Edwin.

"Then the cat did come down from the chimney?" said Phyllis.

We both laughed, and--I can answer for myself--I felt the better for it.

"He came down next day," I said, "and made an excellent lunch of one of
our best fowls. He also killed another, and only just escaped death
himself at the hands of Ukridge."

"Mr. Ukridge doesn't like him, does he?"

"If he does, he dissembles his love. Edwin is Mrs. Ukridge's pet. He is
the only subject on which they disagree. Edwin is certainly in the way
on a chicken farm. He has got over his fear of Bob, and is now
perfectly lawless. We have to keep a steady eye on him."

"And have you had any success with the incubator? I love incubators. I
have always wanted to have one of my own, but we have never kept fowls."

"The incubator has not done all that it should have done," I said.
"Ukridge looks after it, and I fancy his methods are not the right
methods. I don't know if I have got the figures absolutely correct, but
Ukridge reasons on these lines. He says you are supposed to keep the
temperature up to a hundred and five degrees. I think he said a hundred
and five. Then the eggs are supposed to hatch out in a week or so. He
argues that you may just as well keep the temperature at seventy-two,
and wait a fortnight for your chickens. I am certain there's a fallacy
in the system somewhere, because