Page:Herbert Jenkins - Bindle.djvu/234

 At the gates of The Towers he paused. Coming towards him was a dog-cart, driven by a small, fierce-looking little man. It was Mr. Roger Greenhales, who farmed as a hobby, at a considerable yearly loss, to prove that the outcry against the unprofitableness of English land-culture was ridiculous.

Bindle spoke to Mr. Greenhales, and in ten minutes received five shillings. He then proceeded to Holmleigh, where he found his foreman, and also that he had extended his dinner hour into two.

"It's a national affair, I tell you, Wrannock!"

Sir Charles Custance, J. P., leaned back in his library chair, and surveyed the impassive features of Sergeant Wrannock, as if searching for some contradiction; but Sergeant Wrannock of the Suffolk County Constabulary merely shuffled his feet and said:

"Yes, sir!"

"I'll call at the house this afternoon, and see if there's anything to be discovered. I'll go now; damme, if I don't. We'll both go."

Sir Charles jumped up forthwith. He was a short, stout man, with bushy, magisterial eyebrows, a red complexion, a bald head, a monocle, and a fierce don't-argue-with-me-sir manner.