“Sure you’ve looked everywhere?” I said.
“Of course I’ve looked everywhere.”
“Well, you know, I’ve often lost a collar stud and—”
“Do try not to be so maddening, Bertie! I have enough to bear without your imbecilities. Oh, be quiet! Be quiet!” she shouted in the sort of voice used by sergeant-majors and those who call the cattle home across the Sands of Dee. And such was the magnetism of her forceful personality that Wilfred subsided as if he had run into a wall. The chambermaid continued to go strong.
“I say,” I said, “I think there’s something the matter with this girl. Isn’t she crying or something? You may not have spotted it, but I’m rather quick at noticing things.”
“She stole my pearls! I am convinced of it.”
This started the whisker specialist off again, and in about a couple of minutes Aunt Agatha had