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and horse breeding. Military history, with special ref to the Hundred Years War, accounted for a sizeable wall. There was frankly not much in the library of Sir Henry Hackwood to appeal to what one might call the general reader. Where on earth, I wondered, did he keep his detective stories? There was something called The Eustace Diamonds that looked promising, but a quick flip through its pages disappointed. No hint of a corpse anywhere.
    Recalling the urgency of the mission, I pressed on and looked down to the lower shelves. There were a couple of dictionaries and a telephone directory behind a small table with the now useless instrument on it. This looked more promising. And there, between Bradshaw’s Railway Time Tables and An Introduction to Numismatism , lurked a well-used copy of Debrett and a positively dog-eared Burke. Suppressing a small cry of triumph, I bent down and hoiked up the weighty volumes.
    I had got one leg out of the window when I heard a soft contralto behind me say, ‘Hello, Bertie, what on earth are you doing here?’
    I swivelled round to see who spoke, catching the top of the skull a mighty crack on the raised window as I did so. It was Georgiana Meadowes, wearing a summer dress of printed purple flowers, looking if possible even more like something released that instant from the heavenly drawing board than I had remembered.
    ‘I … was er, I was just … Borrowing a book, don’t you know.’
    There was the sound of the old bubbling brook going over the well-tuned harp, which would no doubt have delighted in other circumstances.
    ‘I can’t explain now,’ I went on. ‘I’m helping a chum. It’s all in a good cause, I promise you.’
    ‘I didn’t even know you were in Dorset. You should have telephoned.’
    ‘Pointless in the circs.’ Suddenly, I remembered my manners. ‘Dash it, Georgiana, it’s awfully nice to see you. How are you, old thing?’
    With some difficulty, I reinserted the whole of the person into the library, intending to offer a peck on the cheek. Unfortunately, I caught my toe on the edge of the sill as I touched down, and this made me trip and pretty much stumble into the poor girl, with Burke and Debrett heading off their several ways.
    We brushed ourselves down a bit and I apologised for havingcannoned into her like an open-side rugby forward, ‘Don’t worry, Bertie. At least you didn’t actually floor me this time.’
    ‘Absolutely. Anyway, I’d best be off. Books to read, don’t you know.’
    Georgiana then did an odd thing. She locked the door of the library behind her. ‘I don’t want Sir Henry to burst in,’ she said. ‘Bertie, I think you’re in a bit of a pickle. Do you want to tell me about it?’
    ‘I don’t think so, Georgie. I think I’d really best be off pronto.’
    She let me have the full thousand watts of those brown eyes and I felt the old knees buckle a fraction. A smile began to play around her lips, then lit up the entire physog, like a sunrise speeded up by trick photography.
    ‘Do you often find yourself surprised in the act of theft from country houses where your presence is unannounced?’
    There was a bit of a pause while I mulled this one over. ‘Not often,’ I said. I toyed with the idea of evasion, but we Woosters are wedded to the truth. ‘But it’s not the first time. I do have a tendency to get into scrapes.’
    ‘Is that all you’re going to tell me?’
    ‘It’s all I can for the time being. Though if you should clap eyes on me at any time in the next few days and there’s someone else there, best pretend you don’t know me.’
    ‘Why?’
    ‘I’ll explain one day. I promise you.’
    ‘All right, then. I won’t recognise or acknowledge.’
    ‘Under any circs.’
    ‘I’ve got it. Any circs. Now come on. Let’s get you out of here. But you must promise to telephone me.’
    ‘I … Er, yes, of course.’
    ‘Then maybe you could come and have dinner.’
    ‘I’m not sure I’m top of the list of Sir