Mr. Swenson thought highly
of his hat and this brutal attack upon it confirmed his gloomiest
apprehensions. Now thoroughly convinced that the only thing to do was
to sell his life dearly he wrenched himself round, seized his assailant
by the neck, twined his arms about his middle, and accompanied him
below the surface.
By the time he had swallowed his first pint and was beginning his
second, Sam was reluctantly compelled to come to the conclusion that
this was the end. The thought irritated him unspeakably. This, he felt,
was just the silly, contrary way things always happened. Why should it
be he who was perishing like this? Why not Eustace Hignett? Now there was
a fellow whom this sort of thing would just have suited. Broken-hearted
Eustace Hignett would have looked on all this as a merciful release.
He paused in his reflections to try to disentangle the more prominent
of Mr. Swenson's limbs from about him. By this time he was sure that he
had never met anyone he disliked so intensely as Mr.
Pages:
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57