'I don't like that clerical collar,' he remarked. 'Have you nothing

else?'

The professor of drawing pondered for a moment, and then brightened;

'I have a pair of low-necked shirts,' he said, 'that I used to wear in

Paris as a student. They are rather loud.'

'The very thing!' ejaculated Michael. 'You'll look perfectly beastly.

Here are spats, too,' he continued, drawing forth a pair of those

offensive little gaiters. 'Must have spats! And now you jump into these,

and whistle a tune at the window for (say) three-quarters of an hour.

After that you can rejoin me on the field of glory.'

So saying, Michael returned to the studio. It was the morning of the

easterly gale; the wind blew shrilly among the statues in the garden,

and drove the rain upon the skylight in the studio ceiling; and at about

the same moment of the time when Morris attacked the hundredth version

of his uncle's signature in Bloomsbury, Michael, in Chelsea, began to

rip the wires out of the Broadwood grand.

Three-quarters of an hour later Pitman was admitted, to find the

closet-door standing open, the closet untenanted, and the piano

discreetly shut.

It's a remarkably heavy instrument,' observed Michael, and turned

to consider his friend's disguise. 'You must shave off that beard of

The Wrong Box