bandage about your throat, and, likely as not, your ears stuffed with cotton wool, smelling of camphor."
"Good Lord!" said Renny. "If only the wood pigeons were thick as that now! What shooting! Eh, Floss? Eh, Merlin?"
His tone, the word "shooting," which they perfectly understood, aroused the two clumber spaniels sleeping on either side of his chair. They sprang up with joyous barks.
Above the barking of the dogs Finch raised his voice: "I think I might have something. A fellow going on nineteen can stand a drink or two, I guess."
Renny gently cuffed his dogs. "Down, Merlin. Down, Floss, old pet. What's that, Finch?"
There was silence now and Finch's voice boomed loudly but with an ominous break in it. "I say I'm eighteen and I don't see why I can't have a drink."
Piers said: "Give him a sip of your wine, quickly, Aunt Augusta—he's going to cry."
Finch with difficulty controlled his temper, gazing down at the remnant of apple tart that had been saved for him from the family dinner.
"Give the boy a glass of rum," said Nicholas. "Do him good."
Renny put out a long arm and pushed the decanter, which he had filled with port, across to Finch. "Help yourself, Finch," he said, with a suddenly protective air.
Finch selected a glass and took up the decanter. He was afraid that his hand was going to shake. He set his teeth. He would not let it shake. . . . Not with the eyes of all the family on him. All the family hoping he would do some fool nervous thing. . . . Piers's white teeth showing already between his lips, all too ready for a jeering laugh. . . . He would not let it shake. Oh, God, he was saying to himself, keep my hand from shaking! He knew that he no longer believed in or feared God, yet the less he believed in and feared Him, the more often he flung out these silent invocations for His support.
His hand was steady enough until the glass was almost filled; then it began to shake. He barely escaped
