“The Committee of the Imperial Commission of Liquor Control is directed to draw your attention to the fact that you have disregarded the Committee’s communications under section 5A of the Act for the Regulation of Places of Public Entertainment; and that you are now under Section 47C of the Act amending the Act for the Regulation of Places of Public Entertainment aforesaid. The charges on which prosecution will be founded are as follows:
(1) Violation of sub-section 23f of the Act, which enacts that no pictorial signs shall be exhibited before premises of less than the ratable value of £2000 per annum.
(2) Violation of sub-section 113d of the Act, which enacts that no liquor containing alcohol shall be sold in any inn, hotel, tavern or public-house, except when demanded under a medical certificate from one of the doctors licensed by the State Medical Council, or in the specially excepted cases of Claridge’s Hotel and the Criterion Bar, where urgency has already been proved.
“As you have failed to acknowledge previous communications on this subject, this is to warn you that legal steps will be taken immediately,
“We are yours truly,
Ivywood, President.
J. Leveson, Secretary.”
Mr. Humphrey Pump sat down at the table outside his inn and whistled in a way which, combined with his little whiskers made him for the moment seem literally like an ostler. Then, the very real wit and learning he had returned slowly into his face and with his warm, brown eyes he considered the cold, grey sea. There was not much to be got out of the sea. Humphrey Pump might drown himself in the sea; which would be better for Humphrey Pump than being finally separated from “The Old Ship.” England might be sunk under the sea; which would be better for England than never again having such places as “The Old Ship.” But these were not serious remedies nor rationally attainable; and Pump could only feel that the sea had simply warped him as it had warped his apple trees. The sea was a dreary business altogether. There was only one figure walking on the sands. It was only when the figure drew nearer and nearer and grew to more than human size, that he sprang to his feet with a cry. Also the level light of morning lit the man’s hair, and it was red.
The late King of Ithaca came casually and slowly up the slope of the beach that led to “The Old Ship.” He had landed in a boat from a battleship that could still be seen near the horizon, and he still wore the astounding uniform of apple-green and silver which he had himself invented as that of a navy that had never existed very much, and which now did not exist at all. He had a straight naval sword at his side; for the terms of his capitulation had never required him to surrender it; and inside the uniform and beside the sword there was what there always had been, a big and rather bewildered man with rough red hair, whose misfortune was that he had good brains, but that his bodily strength and bodily passions were a little too strong for his brains.
He had flung his crashing weight on the chair outside the inn before the innkeeper could find words to express his astounded pleasure in seeing him. His first words were “have you got any rum?”