"You think you—you would be missed in Fleet Street—just at first?"
"You are not putting the facts too strongly. I was about to suggest that I should be a 'did not bat.'"
"Oh! I see. Perhaps I ought to tell you that I was talking just now to the sister of their captain."
The editor looked interested.
"About the pad of the gardener?" he said.
"About you. She said—I give you her own words—'Who is the tall, handsome man keeping wicket in a M.C.C. cap?' So I said you were a well-known county player, as she would see when you went in to bat."
The editor shook my hand impressively.
"Thank you very much," he said. "I shall not fail her. What county did you say?"
"Part of Flint. You know the little bit that's got into the wrong county by mistake? That part. She had never heard of it; but I assured her it had a little bit of yellow all to itself on the map. Have you a pretty good eleven?"
The editor swore twice—once for me and once for Flint. Then we went out into the field.