"I have had a call from Mark Wilson this morning," said Richard Grigson.
"Drunk as usual, of course?" put in Tom, interrogatively.
"Well, reasonably so," said the elder brother, laughing lightly. "I don't think he would have faced me till he had fortified himself. But he wasn't very far gone; he knew what he was about."
"He wanted something, I suppose?" suggested Tom.
"You may be sure of that. He wanted two or three things; that is to say, he wanted to know two or three things."
"As for instance?"
"Well, for instance, he wanted to know whether I meant what I wrote to him the other day, that if he hadn't paid his arrears of rent at Christmas, I should distrain."
"And you told him, Dick?—"
"That there was no mistake about it at all," said Mr. Richard Grigson. "And I asked him a question or two. I wanted to know what he would do with a tenant who wouldn't pay his rent."
"And what did he say to that?"