The Paddock, Beckley-on-the-Moor, was about a couple of parasangs from the village, and I set out for it next morning, after partaking of a hearty breakfast at the local inn, practically without a tremor. I suppose when a fellow has been through it as I had in the last two weeks, his system becomes hardened. After all, I felt, whatever this aunt of Sippy’s might be like, she wasn’t Sir Roderick Glossop, so I was that much on velvet from the start.
The Paddock was one of those medium-sized houses with a goodish bit of very tidy garden and a carefully-rolled gravel drive curving past a shrubbery that looked as if it had just come back from the dry-cleaner—the sort of a house you take one look at and say to yourself, “Somebody’s aunt lives there.” I pushed on up the drive, and as I turned the bend I observed in the middle distance a woman messing about by a flowerbed with a trowel in her hand. If this wasn’t the female I was after, I was very much mistaken, so I halted, cleared the throat, and gave tongue.
“Miss Sipperley?”
She had had her back to me, and at the sound of my voice she executed a sort of leap or bound, not unlike a barefoot dancer who steps on a tin-tack halfway through the Vision of Salome. She came to earth and goggled at me in a rather goofy manner. A large, stout female with a reddish face.
“Hope I didn’t startle you?” I said.
“Who are you?”
“My name’s Wooster. I’m a pal of your nephew Oliver.” Her breathing had become more regular.