Jingle,' he said. 'I have to lean out. Do you know the smell of
size? They use it a good deal in spring-cleaning. It's like glue and
decayed fish. House is full of it. It hurts. Horribly. Damnably. I'm
glad you've come, Jingle. I was to have had lunch in the housemaid's
cupboard. But Mabel is an excellent housekeeper. Thorough.'

"Tried to cheer him up. Told him it would soon be over. And Summer
would come.

"'Ah,' he said, 'but if Summer don't! Size and spring-cleaning for
ever and ever. Do you believe in eternal punishment?'

"Lunched at the 'Crown.' Stuffed a whiskey into him. Had six myself.
No good. Said the cold beef tasted of size. Tried to switch him off;
on to politics. Hadn't anything to say on that subject, because there
was no room in his house in which there was enough space left to open
a paper.

"'Everything's put where everything else ought to be,' he said. 'Place
for everything, and my foot in a pail of soapsuds. Did you know that
Washo worked by itself? Have you tried Pingo for the paint? These
pickles taste of Pingo. Had to do the walls of my study-room with it.
Mabel made me. She's an excellent housekeeper. But the world does seem
to be entirely filled with dust, and the smell of decayed fish, don't
you think?'

"Cheerful talk for a luncheon party, wasn't it? That man's on the
verge of a breakdown. Don't like it at all. That wife of his is
overdoing it. Shall look him up again next week. His mind's not right.
He forgot to pay for the lunch. I suggested that I should do it, and
he let me. Something seriously wrong there. Seriously. Have a drink."

4

Three days later Mr. Alfred Jingle resumed the subject.

"I told you things were bad with Sharper. They're worse. Much. I was
there this morning. Enquired at his business place. They said their
Mr. Sharper had gone out. Took a cab to Halfpenny Hole. Halfway there
spotted Sharper sitting on a bank by the roadside with his bicycle
beside him. Face like a tortured hyena. I got out and asked him what
he was doing there.

"'Nowhere else to go,' he said. 'Spring-cleaning at home. And now
they've started spring-cleaning at the office. All my dear little
children piled up on the floor in the dust.'

"Told him I didn't know he had a family.

"'I mean my books. Lilac morocco. At my own expense. The firm wouldn't
stick it. Decorators were sending out for more size when I left. I
can't go back there. Even if there were no spring-cleaning I couldn't