The Girl on the Boat - Penn State University

e a small minority in any audience which does not
appreciate a funny story, and there was one in the
present case. But the bulk of the company roared with
laughter.
“Do you mean,” cried Sir Mallaby, choking, “the poor
idiot just stood there dumb?”
“Well, he made a sort of yammering noise,” said Billie,
“but that only made him look sillier.”
“Deuced good!” chuckled Sir Mallaby.
“Funniest thing I ever heard in my life!” gurgled Mr.
Bennett, swallowing a digestive capsule.
“May have been half-witted,” suggested Mr.
Mortimer.
Sam leaned across the table with a stern set face. He
meant to change the conversation if he had to do it
with a crowbar.
“I hear you have taken a house in the country, Mr.
Mortimer,” he said.
“Yes,” said Mr. Mortimer. He turned to Sir Mallaby.
“We have at last succeeded in persuading your sister,
Mrs. Hignett, to let us rent her house for the summer.”
<strong>The</strong> <strong>Girl</strong> on the Boat
100
Sir Mallaby gasped.
“Windles! You don’t mean to tell me that my sister
has let you have Windles!”
Mr. Mortimer nodded triumphantly.
“Yes. I had completely resigned myself to the prospect
of spending the summer in some other house,
when yesterday I happened to run into your nephew,
young Eustace Hignett, on the street, and he said he
was just coming round to see me about that very thing.
To cut a long story short, he said that it would be all
right and that we could have the house.” Mr. Mortimer
took a sip of burgundy. “He’s a curious boy, young
Hignett. Very nervous in his manner.”
“Chronic dyspepsia,” said Mr. Bennett authoritatively,
“I can tell it at a glance.”
“Is Windles a very lovely place, Sir Mallaby?” asked
Billie.
“Charming. Quite charming. Not large, of course, as
country houses go. Not a castle, I mean, with hundreds
of acres of park land. But nice and compact and comfortable
and very picturesque.”