In Accordance with the Evidence

by Oliver Onions

"Well?" he inquired.

"Well—it doesn't by any means follow that I shall get it."

He stared. "You don't mean to say they'd be such skunks as not to let you off for a day!" he exclaimed.

I laughed. "Perhaps they won't be such skunks," I remarked.

"Oh!" he cried, outraged. "They couldn't!"

He was as ignorant about Rixon Tebb & Masters as he was about everything else in life.

Presently, with a "Brrr!" and a shiver, he got off my bed.

"Well, I'm off," he said. "I didn't intend to come round, and I'm going back to swot."

I heaved myself up from my chair. "Must you? Well, wait a moment—I'll come down with you——"

Before I turned down my lamp, filling the room with the red and green again, I noticed his untouched cup of tea on the floor. I made no remark on it, but as I preceded him down the narrow stairs I found myself suddenly filled with a curiosity as to whether I guessed rightly what was passing in his mind. I had made my shot, and was as interested to know whether it was a true one as if I had had a bet on it.