"Hi, 'Earty!" Bindle called to Mr. Hearty as he left the leader of the glee-party. "When's the Ole Bird comin'?"
Mr. Hearty turned. "The old bird?" he interrogated with lifted eyebrows.
"Lady Knob-Kerrick," bawled Alice, throwing open the door with a flourish.
Lady Knob-Kerrick sailed into the room, her head held high in supercilious superiority. Following her came her companion, Miss Strint, who had carried self-suppression and toadyism to the point of inspiration. Immediately behind came John, Lady Knob-Kerrick's footman, bearing before him the illuminated address, the purse containing fifty Treasury pound notes, and the silver-mounted hot-water bottle.
Bindle started clapping vigorously. Two or three other guests followed suit; but the look Lady Knob-Kerrick cast about her proved to them conclusively that Bindle had done the wrong thing.
"It is most kind of your ladyship to come." Mr. Hearty fussed about Lady Knob-Kerrick, walking deprecatingly upon his toes. She appeared entirely oblivious of his presence. He turned towards the harmonium and made frantic signals to the leader of the glee-party. Suddenly the quartette broke into song, every word ringing out clearly and distinctly:
There's the blue eye and the brown eye, the grave eye and the sad,
There's the pink eye and the green eye and the eye that's rolling mad;
But of all the eyes that eye me, be they merciful or bad,
The eye that I would choose is what they call "The Glad."
THE GLAD EYE.
The last line was rolled out sonorously by the bass.
The company looked at one another in amazement. Lady Knob-Kerrick, scarlet with rage, glared through her lorgnettes at the singers and then at Mr. Hearty, who from where he stood petrified gazed wonderingtly at the glee-party. Mrs. Bindle, with great presence of mind, moved swiftly across the room, and caught the falsetto by the lapel of the coat just as he had opened his mouth to begin his solo verse, dealing with the knowledge acquired by a flapper from the country in the course of a fortnight's holiday in London. Mrs. Bindle made it clear to the leader that as far as the Alton Road Chapel was concerned he was indulging in an optical delusion.