Lord Peter Wimsey went home and slept.

“You know,” said Miss Rossiter to Mr. Smayle, “our newest copy-writer is perfectly potty.”

“Potty?” said Mr. Smayle, showing all his teeth in an engaging smile, “you don’t say so, Miss Rossiter? How, potty?”

“Well, loopy,” explained Miss Rossiter. “Goofy. Blah. He’s always up on the roof, playing with a catapult. I don’t know what Mr. Hankin would say if he knew.”

“With a catapult?” Mr. Smayle looked pained. “That doesn’t seem quite the thing. But we in other spheres, Miss Rossiter, always envy, if I may say so, the happy youthful spirit of the copy-department. Due, no doubt,” added Mr. Smayle, “to the charming influence of the ladies. Allow me to get you another cup of tea.”

“Thanks awfully, I wish you would.” The monthly tea was in full swing, and the Little Conference Room was exceedingly crowded and stuffy. Mr. Smayle edged away gallantly in pursuit of tea, and against the long table, presided over by Mrs. Johnson (the indefatigable lady who ruled the Dispatching, the office-boys and the first-aid cupboard) found himself jostled by Mr. Harris of the Outdoor Publicity.

“Pardon, old fellow,” said Mr. Smayle.

“Granted,” said Mr. Harris, “fascinating young fellows like you are privileged to carry all before them. Ha, ha, ha! I saw you doing the polite to Miss Rossiter-getting on like a house afire, eh?”

Mr. Smayle smirked deprecatingly.

“Wouldn’t you like three guesses at our conversation?” he suggested. “One milk and no sugar and one milk and sugar, Mrs. J., please.”

“There’s two too many,” replied Mr. Harris. “I can tell you. You were talking about Miss Rossiter and Mr. Smayle, hey? Finest subjects of conversation in the world-to Mr. Smayle and Miss Rossiter, hey?”

“Well, you’re wrong,” said Mr. Smayle, triumphantly. “We were discussing another member of the community. The new copy-writer, in fact. Miss Rossiter was saying he was potty.”

“They’re all potty in that department, if you ask me,” said Mr. Harris, waggling his chins. “Children. Arrested development.”

“It looks like it,” agreed Mr. Smayle. “Cross-words I am not surprised at, for everybody does them, nor drawing nursery pictures, but playing with catapults on the roof is really childish. Though what with Miss Meteyard bringing her Yo-Yo to the office with her-”

“I’ll tell you what it is, Smayle,” pronounced Mr. Harris, taking his colleague by the lapel and prodding him with his forefinger, “it’s all this University education. What does it do? It takes a boy, or a young woman for that matter, and keeps him in leading-strings in the playground when he ought to be ploughing his own furrow in the face of reality-Hullo, Mr. Bredon! Was that your toe? Beg pardon, I’m sure. This room’s too small for these social gatherings. I hear you are accustomed to seek the wide, open spaces on the roof.”

“Oh, yes. Fresh air and all that, you know. Exercise. Do you know, I’ve been taking pot-shots at the sparrows with a catapult. Frightfully good training for the eye and that sort of thing. Come up one day and we’ll have a competition.”

“Not for me, thanks,” replied Mr. Harris. “Getting too old for that kind of thing. Though when I was a boy I remember putting a pebble through my old aunt’s cucumber-frame. Lord! how she did scold, to be sure!”

Mr. Harris suddenly looked rather wistful.

“I haven’t had a catapult in my hand for thirty years, I don’t suppose,” he added.

“Then it’s time you took it up again.” Mr. Bredon half pulled a tangle of stick and rubber from his side-pocket and pushed it back again, with a wink and a grimace at the back of Mr. Pym, who now came into view, talking condescendingly to a lately-joined junior. “Between you and me, Harris, don’t you find this place a bit wearisome at times?”

“Wearisome?” put in Mr. Tallboy, extricating himself from the crowd at the table, and nearly upsetting Mr. Smayle’s two cups of tea, now at length achieved, “wearisome? You people don’t know the meaning of the word. Nobody but a lay-out man knows what a lay-out man’s feelings is.”

“You should frivol with us,” said Mr. Bredon. “If the lay-out lays you out, rejuvenate your soul in Roof Revels with Copy-writers. I bagged a starling this morning.”

“What do you mean, bagged a starling?”

“Father, I cannot tell a lie. I did it with my little catapult. But if it’s found,” added Mr. Bredon earnestly, “I expect they will lay the blame on the canteen cat.”

“-apult,” said Mr. Harris. He looked at Mr. Tallboy to see if this play upon words had been appreciated, and seeing that that gentleman looked more than ordinarily blank and unreceptive, he proceeded to rub it in.

“Like the old joke, eh? ‘O take a pill! O take a pill! O take a pilgrim home!’”

“What do you say?” asked Mr. Tallboy, frowning in the effort to concentrate.”

“O blame the cat, don’t you see,” persisted Mr. Harris, “O blame the cat! O blame the catapult! Got me?”

“Ha, ha! very good!” said Mr. Tallboy.

“There was another,” Mr. Harris went on, ‘Oh for a man! Oh for a-”

“Are you a good hand with a catapult, Tallboy?” inquired Mr. Bredon, rather hastily, as though he feared something might explode unless he caused a diversion.

“I haven’t the eye for it.” Mr. Tallboy shook his head, regretfully.

“Eye for what?” demanded Miss Rossiter.

“For a catapult.”

“Oh, go on, Mr. Tallboy! And you such a tennis champion!”

“It’s not quite the same thing,” explained Mr. Tallboy.

“A games’ eye is a games’ eye, surely!”

“An eye’s an eye for a’ that,” said Mr. Harris rather vaguely. “Ever done anything at darts, Mr. Bredon?”

“I won the pewter pot three years running at the Cow and Pump,” replied that gentleman, proudly. “With right of free warren-I mean free beer every Friday night for a twelvemonth. It came rather expensive, though, because every time I had my free pot of beer I had to stand about fifteen to the pals who came to see me drink it. So I withdrew myself from the competition and confined myself to giving exhibition displays.”

“What’s that about darts?”

Mr. Daniels had roamed into view. “Have you ever seen young Binns throw darts? Really quite remarkable.”

“I haven’t yet the pleasure of Mr. Binns’ acquaintance,” acknowledged Mr. Bredon. “I am ashamed to say that there are still members of this great staff unknown to me except by sight. Which, of all the merry faces I see flitting about the passages, is the youthful Mr. Binns?”

“You wouldn’t have seen him, I don’t expect,” said Miss Rossiter. “He helps Mr. Spender in the Vouchers. Go along there one day and ask for a back number of some obscure periodical, and Mr. Binns will be sent to fetch it. He’s a terrific dab at any sort of game.”

“Except bridge,” said Mr. Daniels, with a groan. “I drew him one night at a tournament-you remember, Miss Rossiter, the last Christmas party but two, and he went three no trumps on the ace of spades singleton, five hearts to the king, queen and-”

“What a memory you have, Mr. Daniels! You’ll never forget or forgive those three no trumps. Poor Mr. Binns! He must miss Mr. Dean-they often lunched together.”

Mr. Bredon seemed to pay more attention to this remark than it deserved, for he looked at Miss Rossiter as though he were about to ask her a question, but the conclave was broken up by the arrival of Mrs. Johnson, who, having served out the tea and handed the teapot over to the canteen cook, felt that the time had come for her to join in the social side of the event. She was a large, personable widow, with a surprising quantity of auburn hair and a high complexion, and being built on those majestic lines was, inevitably and unrelentingly, arch.