“I’ve been just outside the Mission House for an hour and three quarters, old chap,” said Mr. Mousley solemnly.  “Most incompatible thing I’ve ever known.  I got back here at a quarter past nine, and I was just going to walk in when the house took two paces to the rear, and I’ve been walking after it the whole evening.  Most incompatible thing I’ve ever known.  Most incompatible thing that’s ever happened to me in my life, Lidderdale.  If I were a superstitious man, which I’m not, I should say the house was bewitched.  If I had a moment to spare, I should sit down at once and write an account of my most incompatible experience to the Society of Psychical Research, if I were a superstitious man, which I’m not.  Yes. . . .”

Mr. Mousley tried to focus his glassy eyes upon the arcana of spiritualism, rocking ambiguously the while upon the kerb.  Mark murmured something more about the need for going in quietly.

“It’s very kind of you to come out and talk to me like this,” the drunken priest went on.  “But what you ought to have done was to have kept hold of the house for a minute or two so as to give me time to get in quietly.  Now we shall probably both be out here all night trying to get in quietly.  It’s impossible to keep warm by this lamp-post.  Most inadequate heating arrangement.  It is a lamp-post, isn’t it?  Yes, I thought it was.  I had a fleeting impression that it was my bedroom candle, but I see now that I was mistaken, I see now perfectly clearly that it is a lamp-post, if not two.  Of course, that may account for my not being able to get into the Mission House.  I was trying to decide which front door I should go in by, and while I was waiting I think I must have gone in by the wrong one, for I hit my nose a most severe blow on the nose.  One has to remember to be very careful with front doors.  Of course, if it was my own house I should have used a latch-key instanter; for I inevitably, I mean invariably, carry a latch-key about with me and when it won’t open my front door I use it to wind my watch.  You know, it’s one of those small keys you can wind up watches with, if you know the kind of key I mean.  I’d draw you a picture of it if I had a pencil, but I haven’t got a pencil.”

“Now don’t stay talking here,” Mark urged.  “Come along back, and do try to come quietly.  I keep telling you it’s after eleven o’clock, and you know Father Rowley likes everybody to be in by ten.”

“That’s what I’ve been saying to myself the whole evening,” said Mr. Mousley.  “Only what happened, you see, was that I met the son of a man who used to know my father, a very nice fellow indeed, a very intellectual fellow.  I never remember spending a more intellectual evening in my life.  A feast of reason and a flowing bowl, I mean soul, s-o-u-l, not b-o-u-l.  Did I say bowl?  Soul. . . .  Soul. . . .”

“All right,” said Mark.  “But if you’ve had such a jolly evening, come in now and don’t make a noise.”