“Yees, sir, they said it ’ad a tail. Where do you go to see it, sir?”
“Go! You don’t want to go anywhere. You’ll see it in your own garden at ten o’clock.”
He thanked me, and, tumbling over a sack of potatoes, plunged head foremost into his punt and departed.
Next morning, I asked him if he had seen the comet.
“No, sir, I couldn’t see it anywhere.”
“Did you look?”
“Yees, sir. I looked a long time.”
“How on earth did you manage to miss it then?” I exclaimed. “It was a clear enough night. Where did you look?”
“In our garden, sir. Where you told me.”
“Whereabouts in the garden?” chimed in Amenda, who happened to be standing by; “under the gooseberry bushes?”