The bottom dropped out of Mr. Polly's world. He felt as people must

feel who are going to faint.

You've got someone--" he said aghast.

She found life inexpressible to Mr. Polly. She addressed some unseen

hearers. "You filthy little Beasts!" she cried with a sharp note of

agony in her voice, and swung herself back over the wall and vanished.

There was a squeal of pain and fear, and a swift, fierce altercation.

For a couple of seconds he stood agape.

Then a wild resolve to confirm his worst sense of what was on the

other side of the wall made him seize a log, put it against the

stones, clutch the parapet with insecure fingers, and lug himself to a

momentary balance on the wall.

Romance and his goddess had vanished.

A red-haired girl with a pigtail was wringing the wrist of a

schoolfellow who shrieked with pain and cried: "Mercy! mercy! Ooo!

Christabel!"

"You idiot!" cried Christabel. "You giggling Idiot!"

Two other young ladies made off through the beech trees from this

The History of Mr Polly