ess and courage that none of
the others seemed to recognise, had nothing to say except about her
broken glass; on this subject, however, she was eloquent. Miss Wangle
managed to convey to those who would listen that her own safety, and in
fact that of Galvin House, was directly due to the intercession of the
bishop, who when alive was particularly noted for the power and
sustained eloquence of his prayers.

Mr. Bolton was frankly sceptical. If the august prelate was out to
save Galvin House, he suggested, it wasn't quite cricket to let them
drop a bomb in the next street.

Everyone was extremely critical of everyone else. Mr. Bolton said
things about Mrs. Barnes and her clothes that made Miss Sikkum blush,
particularly about the nose, where, with her, emotion always first
manifested itself. Mr. Sefton had permanently returned to the "women
and children first" phase and, as two cigarettes were missing from his
case, he was convinced that he had acquitted himself with that air of
reckless bravado that endeared a man to women. He talked pityingly and
tolerantly of Gustave's obvious terror.

Mr. Bolton saw in the adventure material for jokes for months to come.
He laboured at the subject with such misguided industry that Patricia
felt she almost hated him. Some of his allusions, particularly to the
state of sartorial indecision in which the maids had sought cover, were
"not quite nice," as Mrs. Mosscrop-Smythe expressed it to Mrs.
Hamilton, who returned from a visit the day following.

At breakfast everyone had talked, and in consequence everyone who
worked was late for work; the general opinion being, what was the use
of a raid unless you could be late for work? Punctuality on such
occasions being regarded as the waste of an opportunity, and a direct
rebuke to Providence who had placed it there.

Patricia did not take part in the general babel, beyond pointing out,
when Gustave was coming under discussion, that it was he who had gone
to the top of the house to call her. She looked meaningly at Mr.
Bolton and Mr. Sefton, who had the grace to appear a little ashamed of
themselves.

When Patricia returned in the evening, she found Lady Tanagra awaiting
her in the lounge, literally bombarded with different accounts of what
had happened--all narrated in the best "eye-witness" manner of the
alarmist press. Following the precept of Charles Lamb, Galvin House
had apparently striven to correct the bad impression mad