“And who are the multitude?”
“Well, there are Colonel and Mrs. Tompkins—they have two daughters, a niece, and a paying guest. The opium wallah has three daughters; Mrs. Briton, wife of the civil engineer, harbours two friends; the Padre’s wife has two nieces; and the wife of the Major is expecting a relation.”
“Hullo, what’s all this hubbub inside?” enquired Bobby, as the sound of many subdued voices, a scuffling and moving of furniture, came from within.
“Wait and you will see,” replied his brother calmly.
In a moment the chick over the drawing-room door was pushed aside, and two bare-legged coolies came grunting forth backwards; then a portion of the piano—finally the whole instrument—emerged; it was carried by six men, who subsequently bore it away out of the compound, headed by a majestic butler in a gigantic turban.
“I have seen,” declared Bobby, “and now await information.”
“The piano has been borrowed by Mrs. Briton—she is having a musical At Home.”
“How often do you lend it?”
“Well, you see, as I don’t play or use it myself—like a popular novel, it is almost always ‘out.’”
“I say,” exclaimed Bobby, “here is someone coming—I’m off,” and without further hesitation he bolted into the bungalow, and, from behind the chick, beheld two ladies drive up in a high dogcart. They remained talking to the unhappy collector for fully twenty minutes, whilst he stood before them, bare-headed, courteous, resigned.