would he after what
had occurred? Not by a jugful! As soon as ever the sun had risen and
another day begun, their miserable accounts should be paid in full, and
their connection with him cut off. Afterwards it was probable that he
would institute legal proceedings against them in the matter of
trespass and wholesale damage to property, and if they didn't all end
their infernal days in some dashed prison they might consider
themselves uncommonly lucky, and if they didn't make themselves scarce
in considerably under two ticks, he proposed to see what could be done
with Beale's shot-gun. (Beale here withdrew with a pleased expression
to fetch the weapon.) He was sick of them. They were blighters.
Creatures that it would be fulsome flattery to describe as human
beings. He would call them skunks, only he did not see what the skunks
had done to be compared with them. And now they might go--_quick_!

* * * * *

We were quiet at the farm that night. Ukridge sat like Marius among the
ruins of Carthage, and refused to speak. Eventually he took Bob with
him and went for a walk.

Half an hour later I, too, wearied of the scene of desolation. My
errant steps took me in the direction of the sea. As I approached, I
was aware of a figure standing in the moonlight, gazing silently out
over the waters. Beside the figure was a dog.

The dark moments of optimistic minds are sacred, and I would no more
have ventured to break in on Ukridge's thoughts at that moment than, if
I had been a general in the Grand Army, I would have opened
conversation with Napoleon during the retreat from Moscow. I was
withdrawing as softly as I could, when my foot grated on the shingle.
Ukridge turned.

"Hullo, Garny."

"Hullo, old man." I murmured in a death-bedside voice.

He came towards me, Bob trotting at his heels: and, as he came, I saw
with astonishment that his mien was calm, even cheerful. I should have
known my Ukridge better than to be astonished. You cannot keep a good
man down, and already Stanley Featherstonehaugh Ukridge was himself
again. His eyes sparkled buoyantly behind their pince-nez.

"Garny, old horse, I've been thinking, laddie! I've got an idea! The
idea of a lifetime. The best ever, 'pon my Sam! I'm going to start a
duck farm!"

"A duck farm?"

"A duck farm, laddie! And run it without water. My theory is, you see,
that ducks get thin by taking exercise and swimming about all over the
place, so that, if you kept them alway