"Three to one on Cully."
"Who won?" cried the flapper.
"Wait a bit," said Cockles severely. "Don't crab my story. Cully went off at the start and rattled up a couple of fifteens almost before Pip got his cue chalked. He reached his fifty just as Pip got to five."
Sensation.
"The odds," continued the narrator, smacking his lips, "then receded to ten to one, and no takers. Then Cully got to seventy-five just after Pip had reached eighteen—wasn't it, Pip?"
No reply.
"Right-o! Never mind if you're shy. Anyhow, old Cully, being naturally a bit above himself, gave a sort of chuckle, and said, 'What odds now, Pip, old man?'"
"Ooh!" said Miss Dorothy Chell. "How rash! It was quite enough to change your luck, Mr. Cullyngham."
"Did you tap wood when you said it, Mr. Cullyngham?" screamed the flapper down the table.
Mr. Cullyngham, possibly owing to the effort involved in keeping up a protracted smile, did not reply.