"What the devil were you doing coming into our drive at five in the morning?"
Tietjens, who had applied the half petticoat to the horse's chest, exclaimed:
"Pick up that thing and give it me." A thin roll of linen was at his feet: it had rolled down from the hedge.
"Can I leave the horse?" the General asked.
"Of course you can," Tietjens said. "If I can't quiet a horse better than you can run a car . . ."
He bound the new linen strips over the petticoat: the horse dropped its head, smelling his hand. The General, behind Tietjens, stood back on his heels, grasping his gold-mounted sword. Tietjens went on twisting and twisting the bandage.
"Look here," the General suddenly bent forward to whisper into Tietjens' ear, "what am I to tell Claudine? I believe she saw the girl."
"Oh, tell her we came to ask what time you cast off your beastly otter hounds," Tietjens said; "that's a matutinal job. . . ."
The General's voice had a really pathetic intonation:
"On a Sunday!" he exclaimed. Then in a tone of relief he added: "I shall tell her you were going to early communion in Duchemin's church at Pett."