THE DERSINGHAMS AT HOME 137

"Sorry, but—er—" and here Mr. Dersingham looked
round apologetically at his guests—"I'm afraid there's
been some sort of accident outside."

Immediately, Mrs. Trape, Mrs. Pearson, Major Trape,
and Mr. Pearson began talking all at once, not talking
about this accident, but about accidents in general, with
special reference to very queer accidents that had hap-
pened to them. Miss Verever merely looked peculiarly
at everybody, while Mr. Golspie finished his claret with a
certain remote gloom, as if he were a man taking quinine
on the summit of a mountain.

Then the door, which had not been properly fastened,
swung open again, to admit a mixed knocking and
gobbling and guggling noise that suggested that Agnes
was now lying on the floor, in hysterics, and drumming
her feet. Then came a new voice, very hoarse and re-
sentful, and this voice declared that it was all a crying
shame, even if the girl was clumsy with her hands, and
that one pair of hands was one pair of hands and could
not be expected to be any more, and that while notices
were being given right and left, her notice could be
taken, there and then. In short, the cook had arrived
on the scene.

Mr. Dersingham arose miserably, but whether to shut
the door again or to make an entrance into the drama
outside we shall never know, for Mrs. Pearson, fired with
neighbourly solicitude, sprang up, crying, "Poor Mrs.
Dersingham! I'm sure I ought to do something," and
was outside, with the door closed behind her, before Mr,
Dersingham knew what was happening.

And Mrs. Pearson, once outside, did not simply in-
trude, did not gape and hang about and get in the way,
but took charge of the situation, for though Mrs. Pearson