the recipes for my great-grandmother evidently had a weakness for skins

of a miscellaneous origin, and his handwriting was cramped to the last

degree. Some of the things are quite unreadable to me--though my family,

with its Indian Civil Service associations, has kept up a knowledge

of Hindustani from generation to generation--and none are absolutely

plain sailing. But I found the one that I knew was there soon enough,

and sat on the floor by my safe for some time looking at it.



"Look here," said I to Pyecraft next day, and snatched the slip away

from his eager grasp.



"So far as I--can make it out, this is a recipe for Loss of Weight.

("Ah!" said Pyecraft.) I'm not absolutely sure, but I think it's that.

And if you take my advice you'll leave it alone. Because, you know--

I blacken my blood in your interest, Pyecraft--my ancestors on

that side were, so far as I can gather, a jolly queer lot. See?"



"Let me try it," said Pyecraft.



I leant back in my chair. My imagination made one mighty effort

and fell flat within me. "What in Heaven's name, Pyecraft," I asked,

"do you think you'll look like when you get thin?"



He was impervious to reason. I made him promise never to say a word

to me about his disgusting fatness again whatever happened--never,

and then I handed him that little piece of skin.



"It's nasty stuff," I said.



"No matter," he said, and took it.



He goggled at it. "But--but--" he said.



He had just discovered that it wasn't English.



"To the best of my ability," I said, "I will do you a translation."



I did my best. After that we didn't speak for a fortnight. Whenever he

approached me I frowned and motioned him away, and he respected

our compact, but at the end of a fortnight he was as fat as ever.

And then he got a word in.



"I must speak," he said. "It isn't fair. There's something wrong.

It's done me no good. You're not doing your great-grandmother justice."



"Where's the recipe?"



He produced it gingerly from his pocket-book.



I ran my eye over the items. "Was the egg addled?" I asked.



<< previous page | next page >>

Jump to page: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36 | 37 | 38 | 39 | 40 | 41 | 42 | 43 | 44 | 45 | 46 | 47 | 48 | 49 | 50 | 51 | 52 | 53 | 54 | 55 | 56 | 57 | 58 | 59 | 60 | 61 | 62 | 63 | 64 | 65 | 66 | 67 | 68 | 69 | 70 | 71 | 72 | 73 | 74 | 75 | 76 | 77 | 78 | 79 | 80 | 81 | 82 | 83 | 84 | 85 | 86 | 87 | 88 | 89 | 90 | 91 | 92 | 93 | 94 | 95 | 96 | 97 | 98 | 99 | 100 | 101 | 102 | 103 | 104 | 105 | 106 | 107 | 108 | 109 | 110 | 111 | 112 | 113 | 114 | 115 | 116 | 117 | 118 | 119 | 120 | 121 | 122 | 123 | 124 | 125 | 126 | 127 | 128 | 129 | 130 | 131 | 132 | 133 | 134 | 135 | 136 | 137 | 138 | 139 | 140 | 141 | 142 | 143 | 144 | 145 | 146 | 147 | 148 | 149 | 150 | 151 | 152 | 153 | 154 | 155 | 156 | 157 | 158 | 159 | 160 | 161 |