“Well, and wouldn’t that be ripping?”
They admitted that it would.
“Have you ever been down a fire-escape, Clifford?” asked Pickering.
“Me? Down a fire-escape? Wait a minute, let me think. No, no. Now I come to think of it, upon my word, I don’t think I ever have. Not down a fire-escape.”
“Ah, I thought not,” said Pickering knowingly, as if he had spent his life doing nothing else. “No, you wouldn’t have.”
“Well, have you?”
“Me?” said Pickering. “Well, I don’t know that I have, exactly. But I know all about it. Besides I once drove to a fire with one of the firemen. It was jolly.”
“But you’re not going to give a fire-escape performance to-night, are you? I thought you were only going to have fireworks.”
“Yes, of course, that’s all, and there’s no danger really. How surprised the people in the street will be when they see those ripping rockets go whizzing up! I daresay we shall have a crowd round us.”