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“You see,” Peter cried indignantly, “what a shufflin’ old hypocrite he is. You can’t get a straight answer from him about old Pig-Face, and he knows what an old brute he is just as well as we do.”

“Shall we send dear Archibald into one of the smaller houses?” Tod asked thoughtfully.

“No,” Peter thundered. “He’s going to old Pig-Face, and to no one else. Who knows but he may save some decent chap from going there? Let’s write again to the Pot, it’s such a lark, he answers so nice and quick. Why, there’s over a fortnight more of the holidays; we can get a whole volume of his oily old letters by that time. I’ve always wondered how humbugs like him manage to grease up to one’s people so, and for the life of me I can’t see why now.”

That night the twins again engaged in literary labors, much to their uncle’s surprise, but he was an ardent bridge player, and, having found three like-minded anglers at the village inn, he was glad to leave his lively nephews so peacefully employed.

“Are you chaps writing a story?” he asked that evening as he departed to his bridge.