Page:Love among the chickens (1909).djvu/39

 passage of the stairs, "settle down and let's talk business. Found cabby gibbering on doorstep. Wouldn't believe I didn't want to bilk him. Had to give him an extra shilling. But now, about business. Lucky to find you in, because I've got a scheme for you, Garny, old boy. Yes, sir, the idea of a thousand years. Now listen to me for a moment."

He sat down on the table and dragged a chair up as a leg rest. Then he took off his pince-nez, wiped them, readjusted the wire behind his ears, and, having hit a brown patch on the knee of his gray flannel trousers several times in the apparent hope of removing it, began to speak.

"About fowls," he said.

"What about them?" asked Garnet. The subject was beginning to interest him. It showed a curious tendency to creep into the conversation.

'I want you to give me your undivided