Lucky Jim

What was he going to do about his trousers? Which would be worst: mending them himself, which would involve finding, or more likely re-buying, the required materials, having them repaired at a shop, which meant remembering to ask someone where such a shop could be found, remembering to take the trousers to it and remembering to fetch and pay for them, or asking Miss Cutler to do them? Would the last be quickest?

Yes; but it might carry with it the penalty of watching the operation and being talked to by Miss Cutler during it and for an incalculable time after it. Apart from a pair belonging to a suit much too dark for anything but interviews and funerals, his only other trousers were so stained with food and beer that they would, if worn on the stage to indicate squalor and penury, be considered ridiculously overdone. Welch should do the repairs. It was his horrible car, wasn't it? Why hadn't he torn his own vile trousers on the barbed seat? Perhaps he would soon. Or perhaps he had already without noticing.

Passing under the thatched barbette over the front door, Dixon averted his eyes from a picture Welch had recently bought and talked about and which now hung in the hall. The work of some kindergarten oaf, it recalled in its technique the sort of drawing found in male lavatories, though its subject, an assortment of barrel-bodied animals debouching from the Ark, was of narrower appeal. On the other side was a high shelf with an array of copper and china utensils on it. Among them was Dixon's special Toby jug, and, sneering, he now fixed this with his eye. He hated that Toby jug, with its open black hat, its blurred, startled face, its spindle-limbs coalesced with its torso, more strenuously than any other inanimate occupant of this house, not excepting Welch's recorder. Its expression proved that it knew what he thought of it, and it could tell nobody. He put a thumb on each of his temples, waggled his hands at it, rolled his eyes, mouthed jeers and imprecations. A third Welch property now manifested itself, a young ginger cat called Id. It was the only survivor of a litter of three; the other two Mrs Welch had christened Ego and Super-Ego. Trying his best not to think of this, Dixon bent and tickled Id under the ear. He admired it for never allowing either of the senior Welches to pick it up. 'Scratch 'em,' he whispered to it; 'pee on the carpets.' It began to purr loudly.

As soon as Dixon had joined the company within, the leisurely tempo of his day jerked abruptly into frenzy. Welch wheeled towards him;

Christine, more apple-cheeked even than he remembered her, was grinning at him in the background; Mrs Welch and Bertrand moved in his direction;

Margaret turned her back. Welch said energetically: 'Oh, Faulkner.'

Dixon's nose twitched his gksses up. 'Yes, Professor.'

'At least, Dixon.' He hesitated, then went on with unprecedented fluency: 'I'm afraid there's been a bit of a mix-up, Dixon. I'd forgotten that we'd all promised to go to the theatre this evening with the Goldsmiths. We shall have to dine early, so I shall just have time to change and freshen up and drive us into town. There'll be room for you if you want a lift, you see. I'm sorry about it, of course, but I shall have to rush off now. We must have you over another time.'

Before he was out of the room, Mrs Welch moved up like an actress dead on her cue. Bertrand was at her side. Rather red in the face, she said: 'Oh, Mr Dixon, I've been wondering when I should see you again. I've one or two points I want to take up with you. First of all, I'd like you to explain, if you can, just what happened to the sheet and blankets on your bed when you were our guest here recently.' While Dixon was still trying to moisten his mouth enough to speak, she added: ' I'm waiting for an answer, Mr Dixon.' The Englishwoman in her seemed, for the moment, to have forged well ahead of the Western European.

Dixon noticed that Christine and Margaret had moved down the room together, talking quietly. 'I don't quite know what…' he mumbled. 'I didn't see…' How could he have forgotten what she'd said over the phone on the occasion of the Beesley-Etvxmg /Post /impersonation? It hadn't crossed his mind once in the meantime.

'Am I to understand that you deny having had anything to do with the matter? If so, the only other possible culprit's my maid, in which case I shall have to…'

'No,' Dixon broke in, 'I don't deny it. Please, Mrs Welch, I'm desperately sorry about it all. I know I should have come to you and told you about it, but I'd done so much damage I was afraid to. It was silly, I hoped you somehow wouldn't find out, but I really knew you would, of course. Will you send me the bill for what it costs you to replace it? blankets as well, I mean. I must make it good.' Thank God they still didn't know about the table.

' Of course you must, Mr Dixon. Before we discuss that, though, I want to hear how the damage was caused. Exactly what happened, please?'