Our friend stuck his legs apart, balanced on them, and said, after looking round the room, “You had better put a coat on. It’s a cold night.”
This made me look up. “Eh?” I said.
“You’re coming with us,” he answered.
“Coming with you?”
“We’ve found ammunition in the house,” he announced, “and we’re taking every man in the house.”
“Ammunition?”
“Oh yes, you know nothing about it, of course. It was in Mrs. Slaney’s bedroom.”
“But I’m a married man,” I expostulated. “How am I likely to know what’s in Mrs. Slaney’s bedroom?”
A brief three-handed conversation, in which my wife joined, took place, and at the end of it I submitted to fate, and wrapped myself in my oldest overcoat. The last of the party had tramped down the stairs. The raid was over.
Mrs. Slaney came in looking double her size with indignation.