never been in the Shanghai Club in his life. More, that he has never been

farther east than India, where he juggled with tins of bully beef and plum and

apple jam during the Great War. But the colonel is determinedly military, and in

King’s Abbot we permit people to indulge their little idiosyncrasies freely.

 

“Shall we begin?” said Caroline.

 

We sat round the table. For some five minutes there was complete silence, owing

to the fact that there is tremendous secret competition amongst us as to who can

build their wall quickest.

 

“Go on, James,” said Caroline at last. “You’re East Wind.”

 

I discarded a tile. A round or two proceeded, broken by the monotonous remarks

of “Three Bamboos,” “Two Circles,” “Pung,” and frequently from Miss Ganett

“Unpung,” owing to that lady’s habit of too hastily claiming tiles to which she

had no right.

 

“I saw Flora Ackroyd this morning,” said Miss Ganett. “Pung—no—Unpung.

 

I made a mistake.”

 

“Four Circles,” said Caroline. “Where did you see her?”

 

“She didn’t see _me_,” said Miss Ganett, with that tremendous significance only