Page:Herbert Jenkins - Bindle.djvu/91

 "'Ere, you look arter each other," Bindle cried, "it's murder this time." And he sped down the corridor.

He entered No. 21 to find locked together in a deadly embrace the clergymnan and a little bald-headed man in pyjamas. In the bed was a figure, Bindle mentally commended its daintiness, rising up from a foam of frillies and shrieking at the top of her voice "silly things wot wasn't even words," as Bindle afterwards told Mrs. Hearty.

"Mon Dieu! Men Dieu! Il sera tué!"

"Regular fightin' parson," muttered Bindle, as he strove to part the men. "If 'e don't stop a-bumpin' 'is 'ead on the floor 'e'll break it. 'Ere, stop it, sir. Yer mustn't use 'is 'ead as if it was a cokernut and yer wanted the milk. Come orf!" Bindle had seized the clergyman from behind, and was pulling with all his strength as he might at the collar of a bellicose bull-terrier.

"Come orf, yer mustn't do this sort o' thing in an 'otel. I'm surprised at you, sir, a clergyman too."

Half choking, the clergyman rose to his feet, and strove to brush the flood of hair from his eyes. His opponent seized the opportunity and flew back to bed, where he sat trying to staunch the blood that flowed from his nose and hurling defiance at his enemy.

"Wot's it all about?" enquired Bindle.