The Wrong Man 143 



stant presence in the smoking-room of the Kingdom and 

 Colonies, when he was in town, arose, not from a devotion 

 to tobacco, but from anxiety to make Sir George's ac- 

 quaintance. Higgs was determined that the Towers 

 should * go,' in fact. He did not propose to angle for 

 social advancement with food and wine for baits, after 

 the vulgar fashion of the mistaken Thompson. He would 

 offer well-stocked coverts ; he would have some good 

 horses in his stable — perhaps a horse or two in some 

 training stable ; for owning the favourite for a big race 

 was, he knew, the way to get one's name up, though, 

 personally, he scarcely knew a racehorse from a shorthorn 

 bull. He had, moreover, occupied for the last three 

 years a deer forest in Scotland, the annual pilgrimage to 

 which was among the disagreeables of his existence ; for 

 he was a wretchedly bad walker, and had never succeeded 

 in hitting a stag on any of the very few occasions when 

 he had ' stayed ' throughout a stalk, though he feels 

 certain that he could not have missed the finest beast he 

 had ever got a chance at but for the unfortunate fact 

 that just as he was getting comfortably into position he 

 accidentally touched the trigger of his rifle, cutting the 

 leather of Donald's boot with the bullet — a near thing 

 for Donald. In fact, he had quite given up stalking, and 

 always went out alone when he took his gun, having 

 found it difficult to give an attendant a fresh reason why 

 he missed every grouse that got up. But a forest in 

 Scotland is a great thing to have. It is not everybody 

 who can offer a man a week's stalking ; very few people 

 indeed enjo}^ such a privilege, and, hating Scotland as 

 he did, he kept up his tenancy for purposes of social 

 advancement. 



Why does Mr. Higgs this morning abandon the study 



