The chapter entitled "Inexorable Child-Logic" shows Saki's children displaying a wisdom beyond their years in order to highlight the stupidity and lack of imagination of their elders.  In "The Domain of Miracle" the supernatural is the instrument which overthrows the accepted order, lack of perception being punished in proportion to its enormity.  If these are improbable means of unveiling the underlying truths, then even more surprising and ironic are the tricks Saki employs in this next group of stories.  In this chapter, which deals with practical jokes and lies with a purpose, Saki wields his most celebrated and arguably his most powerful weapon in the war against complacency and fatuity.

There are certain key factors which ensure the success of the lie or joke.  They are: glibness, particularly evident in the out-talking stories; inventiveness which applies equally to the liars and the jokers; a delight in the outrageous; a fantastical imagination and the ability to turn the tables by quick thinking; again elements which recur throughout the stories.  Coupled with these traits is the belief that "if a lie was worth telling it was worth telling well" (p.331) as Clovis says in "The Forbidden Buzzards", thoroughness and attention to detail appearing to be the keynotes.

"Talking-Out"

An "ability to talk out time" as Cobley¹ expresses it, is a feature not exclusive to Reginald,² though he is the earliest and most obvious exponent, but a characteristic of Clovis also.  In "The Talking-Out of Tarrington", for instance, in which he heads off a bore, Clovis congratulates himself: 'I shall certainly go in for a Parliamentary career' [...], as he turned complacently to rejoin his aunt.  'As a talker-out of inconvenient bills I should be invaluable'" (p.193), a neat gibe at politicians.  In similar vein "Clovis on Parental Responsibilities" demonstrates his glibness in talking another bore to a standstill.  In this case, Marion Eggelby is bent on discussing her children and, needless to say, the subject of children is hardly mentioned by Clovis, the whole tenor of his discourse being wickedly irresponsible and calculated to scandalize.  It is a very good example of what one Spectator article would describe as a "handbook of the gentle art of dealing faithfully with social nuisances".³

The two stories have in common a series of deliberate misunderstandings which give rise to wild digressions designed to shock.  In "The Talking-Out of Tarrington", Clovis begins the unequal contest with "a 'silent upon-a -peak-in-Darien' stare"(p.191).⁴  He is rude on the subject of Tarrington's moustache, and dismissive about his name which he suggests would suit a pet owl.  By this time Tarrington, "pale but still resolute" (p.191) in his determination to be invited to the prestigious picnic given by Clovis's aunt, insists that he met Clovis "'at luncheon at your aunt's house once'" (p.191).  Clovis, however, denies the possibility of this since "'she belongs to the National Anti-Luncheon League'" (p.192).  The story concludes after a further sally from Clovis with Tarrington retiring defeated from the field "with the reflection that a picnic which included the presence of Clovis might prove a doubtfully agreeable experience" (pp.192-93).

Similarly, in "Clovis on Parental Responsibilities," Marion Eggelby who starts out insisting, "'You would like Eric'" (p.337), ends up responding to Clovis's cheerful and ambiguous, "'I quite look forward to meeting him some day'" (p.339), with a suppressed, "'I'll take care that you never shall!'" (p.339).

Perhaps the most celebrated of all the out-talking stories is "A Defensive Diamond" in which the lie is elevated to an art form.  Treddleford is spending a dismal wet October evening comfortably in his armchair before a blazing fire in his club with a favourite book, the ultimate in escapist literature: The Golden Journey to Samarkand.  There intrudes upon this idyll, "Amblecope, the man with the restless, prominent eyes and the mouth ready mobilized for conversational openings" (p.354), a description which leaves no doubt that he is a compulsive talker, the sort of person to be avoided at all costs.⁵

Amblecope sits near him and "turning his large challenging eyes on Treddleford" (p.355) plunges into discussion of the Grand Prix which Treddleford successfully cuts short.  Undeterred, Amblecope becomes "spuriously interested in the picture of a Mongolian pheasant" (p.355) and proceeds to recount a boastful shooting story.  Before he can fairly launch himself, Treddleford counters with a tale of his own about "'my aunt, who owns the greater part of Lincolnshire'" (p.355), a story which is so wildly improbable that it evokes a snappish response from Amblecope.  But Treddleford is in command.  "'The story rests on my aunt's authority', said Treddleford coldly, 'and she is local vice-president of the Young Women's Christian Association'"(p.356), a guarantee of respectability equal to that of being a Justice of the Peace in "Gabriel-Ernest" or "The Hedgehog".

Still undaunted, Amblecope begins a fishing story but no sooner has he started than Treddleford again takes over with an amazing tale about his "'uncle, the Bishop of Southmolton'" (p.356) (the better-connected he can claim to be the more he can confound Amblecope who, like most bores, is also a fearful snob) which involves a van-load of blotting-paper toppling over a bridge into a pool, sucking up all the water and allowing his uncle to walk down and collect a giant trout which is thus left high and dry.  The response to this flight of fancy is "silence for nearly half a minute" (p.356) before Amblecope "in a rather tired and dispirited voice" (p.356) starts reminiscing about motor accidents, inevitably capped by Treddleford who, scenting victory, describes his sister's "'sensational carriage accident'" (p.356) involving two camels mounting Lady Nineveh's grand staircase.  This proves too much for Amblecope who removes his unwanted presence at last, leaving Treddleford to the peaceful resumption of his book.

The coup-de-grâce is delivered in the last sentence by Treddleford as his path and Amblecope's converge at the door of the room.  "'I believe I take precedence,' he said coldly; 'you are merely the club Bore; I am the club Liar.'" (p.358).  Here is plenty of evidence to support Clovis's belief that "if a lie was worth telling it was worth telling well." In this story there are also all the essential ingredients to be found in the practical jokes too: glibness in out-talking, inventiveness, outrageous lies told to shock, fantasy in abundance and turning the tables.

In "Mark", the author Augustus Mellowkent learns how to harness fiction for his own purposes in much the same way as in "A Defensive Diamond", "The Talking-Out of Tarrington" and the rest.  He has adopted the name Mark on the advice of his publisher since Mark,"'besides being alliterative, conjures up a vision of some one strong and beautiful and good, a sort of blend of Georges Carpentier⁶ and the reverend What's-his-name'" (p.470) and it is in assuming this new persona that he turns "a spirit of wistful emulation" (p.472) to good account.

The kind of banal fiction that Mark writes is demonstrated by such trite excerpts as the description of the young girl's attraction to the postman, where "'their eyes met, for the merest fraction of a second, yet nothing could ever be quite the same again'" (p.471).  In resolving to "'break the intolerable, unreal silence'" (p.471) she asks with appalling bathos, "'How is your mother's rheumatism?'" (p.471).  The interruption of the salesman, Caiaphas Dwelf, is an obvious annoyance to Mellowkent as he writes his latest novel, though it is his indecisiveness which allows it.  "The importance of the visitor's mission was probably illusory, but he had never met any one with the name Caiaphas before" (p.471).  Saki tempts the reader to wonder if he had ever met anyone called Dwelf.⁷

Like Amblecope and the rest, Dwelf's "cold grey eyes, and determined manner bespoke an unflinching purpose" (p.471) as he proceeds to try selling the author an encyclopaedia, turning Mellowkent's every objection to his advantage.  Caiaphas is humourless and impervious to all Mark's attempts to sidetrack him, ignoring even a direct request to leave.

It is at this point that Mark has his "sudden inspiration" (p.473), a turning point equal to that of Eshley in "The Stalled Ox".⁸  He uses the salesman's own ploy by offering to sell him some of his novels and quoting from them extensively as an incentive.  Caiaphas interrupts "with a tired note sounding in his voice for the first time" (p.473) just like Amblecope's "rather tired and dispirited voice".  But Mark presses home his advantage by reading from The Reluctance of Lady Cullumpton (p.473)⁹ despite Caiaphas's reiteration "'I don't read novels'" (p.473).  Just like Amblecope in "A Defensive Diamond", he retires defeated.  "With a muttered remark about having no time to waste on monkey-talk" (p.474) he ignores the triumphant Mark's "cheerful 'Good morning'" (p.474).  Mark "fancied that a look of respectful hatred flickered in the cold, grey eyes" (p.474), again, as in so many of the stories, eyes either concealing or revealing underlying feelings.  Mark resembles Treddleford in "A Defensive Diamond" in having turned the tables on an unwelcome intruder in a manner which will permanently enhance his future standing.  Treddleford will never again have to endure the club Bore and Mark has gained a new self-respect.

"Adventurer Purse-Sappers"

Those who lie in order to make a living, called by Saki in "The Square Egg" "that great army of adventurer purse-sappers" (p.541) also abound.  They are seldom successful, however, since their intended victims are generally more than a match for them.  Take the example of "The Romancers" where Norton Crosby notes "out of the corner of his eye" (p.279) a figure who is clearly by his appearance a "professional cadger" (p.279).  Part of the giveaway sign is "the furtive, evasive eye" (p.279)¹⁰ of the newcomer.  The fact that Crosby has spotted him out of the corner of his eye says much about Crosby's character too.

Initially the newcomer "fixed his eyes straight in front of him in a strenuous unseeing gaze" (p.280) before embarking in wheedling tones on a series of attempts to elicit money from Crosby.  But he is thwarted at every turn, Crosby "making an excursion himself into the realms of fiction" (p.280) whenever necessary.  Despite several temporary defeats one of which results in a "bewildered silence for a moment" (p.280),¹¹ the cadger doggedly pursues his course.  The realms of Crosby's fantasy range from Persia, through "'the story of Ibrahim and the eleven camel-loads of blotting-paper'" (p.281)¹² to "'Yom [...] which is in Southern Afghanistan'" (p.281).  Crosby is not engaged merely in parrying, he is actively leading the cadger on, raising his hopes until "the listener's eyes were glittering" (p.282).  But his hopes are short-lived and the cadger is left muttering to himself in much the same way as the routed Caiaphas Dwelf, "'I don't believe a word of his story [...] pack of nasty lies from beginning to end'" (p.283).  As Saki ironically sums up, "two of a trade never agree" (p.283).

In "Dusk" another character with a curiously similar name, Norman Gortsby, is joined on a park bench by a young man who claims that he is penniless, having left his money together with his possessions in an elusive hotel which he left in order to buy some soap.  Gortsby, like Crosby, responds initially in a manner which encourages optimism, by saying that he has had a similar experience himself but then adds, "'the weak point of your story is that you can't produce the soap'" (p.300).  The young man pretends to a frantic and futile search for it.  "'I must have lost it,' he muttered angrily" (p.300), the anger because his bluff has been called.

Gortsby's Wildean¹³ remark "'To lose an hotel and a cake of soap on one afternoon suggests wilful carelessness'" (p.300) pursues him as he disappears from view.

Gortsby's complacent reflection that it was a pity that he could not produce the soap, since "in his particular line genius certainly consists of an infinite capacity for taking precautions" (p.300) (thoroughness in fabrication again being emphasised in the surprise substitution of the word "precautions") is interrupted by his catching sight of a bar of soap lying beside the bench.  He jumps to the conclusion that "it had evidently fallen out of the youth's overcoat pocket" (p.300), 'evidently' again having ironic force, and he rushes after him to tell him that "'the important witness to the genuineness of your story has turned up'" (p.301).  In his own defence he adds, "'You must excuse my disbelief, but appearances were really rather against you'" (p.301) and he offers to lend him a sovereign which the youth accepts with a show of emotion which Gortsby erroneously attributes to relief.  It is, of course, suppressed mirth at the happy coincidence which has provided the circumstantial evidence he needed.  The soap has been lost by the previous occupant of the park bench, as the last sentence reveals to Gortsby.

Yet another twist to this theme is provided by "A Shot in the Dark"¹⁴ in which the cadging youth turns out to be just who he claims to be with embarrassing consequences to Sletherby who is seeking the sponsorship of the youth's mother in a forthcoming parliamentary election.

Women seem to be more successful purse-sappers than men, as "A Holiday Task" shows.  Kenelm Jerton, with a morbid self-consciousness to equal that of Theodoric Voler in "The Mouse", is picked out by a "Lady" in a hotel restaurant.  Using the device of selective amnesia she lunches extravagantly, organises Kenelm to look through back numbers of a magazine for traces of her identity, and gambles ten pounds on a horse, before borrowing money from him to pay her cab fares and hotel bill, and leaving him in charge of luggage which she "had to invent" (p.341), for reasons of respectability, and which belongs to someone else.  She turns out to be a "Lady Champion at golf" (p.344) - a justification for her recollection that she is "Lady Somebody" (p.340) - who has a habit of losing her memory from time to time and becomes furious "if you make any allusion to it afterwards" (p.344) thereby ensuring that any money owing will remain unpaid.

Another cunning woman exploits a feeble man in "The Name-Day", a story in which the timid J.J.  Abbleway, is snowbound in a train between Austria and Croatia.  His plight is shared by an imperturbable peasant woman with an eye to the main chance who capitalises on his fears by selling him food at extortionate prices.  As she points out "with relentless logic" (p.370) (a quality shared by Saki's children) there is no cheaper food to be had on the train.  She does nothing to allay his fears, fuelling them indeed by the dispassionate relating of past mischances befalling travellers in similar circumstances, and claiming immunity from harm herself since "'it is the day of Saint Mariä Kleophä, my name-day'" (p.369).

As he gazes fearfully out of the window he sees what he believes to be wolves, and the peasant woman does not disabuse him.  "'There are hundreds of them,' whispered Abbleway [...].  We shall be devoured'" (p.370), but the peasant woman merely replies, "'Not me, on my name-day'" (p.370).  "The long torture-laden minutes passed slowly away" (p.371)¹⁵ until to his horror the woman leaves the train to what the squeamish Abbleway believes to be her certain death from wolves as "two gaunt lean figures rushed upon her from the forest" (p.371).¹⁶ He hides his face not wanting "to see a human being torn to pieces and devoured before his eyes" (p.371).  But this cowardly feeling is replaced by "a new sensation of scandalized astonishment" (p.371) when he sees the wolves gambolling playfully about her, and realises he has been duped, that the 'wolves' are in fact dogs.  This rational explanation while humiliating is nevertheless a great relief to him since "he was not prepared to be the witness of a miracle" (p.371) in which respect he much resembles the unimaginative van Cheele, Sylvia Seltoun and the rest.¹⁷

"Invent Something"

If J.J.  Abbleway and his like wish the even tenor of their lives to remain undisturbed, it is a craving for something truly exciting to happen which is Blenkinthrope's undoing in "The Seventh Pullet".  A desire to be found interesting motivates him to enlist the help of a fellow commuter in making up entertaining stories.  Initially reluctant to "'invent something'" (p.288) as instructed by the Mephistophelean Gorworth,¹⁸ Blenkinthrope nevertheless succumbs to the temptation to spin a fantastic yarn, having pictured himself "telling it in the train amid the absorbed interest of his fellow-passengers" (p.289) and goaded by the equally unlikely tales of the others.  The "wistfulness" (p.289)¹⁹ gives way to an embellished version of Gorworth's story.²⁰

His temporary limelight is eclipsed, however, by "Smith-Paddon, a daily fellow-traveller, whose little girl had been knocked down and nearly hurt by a car belonging to a musical-comedy actress" (p.290).  The fact that the actress was absent at the time in no way diminishes Smith-Paddon's celebrity and says much about the empty lives of these sensation-mongers.  Blenkinthrope's next excursion into the realms of fantasy is so incredible as to accredit him thereafter with being "the Munchausen of the party" (pp.291-92).

If this newfound glory has its rewards it also carries a bitter punishment.  The only truly sensational event of his humdrum life occurs when his wife of whom he "had been genuinely fond" (p.292), dies instantly upon the successful completion of "'the Death's Head patience'" (p.292) which has already caused the sudden death of her mother and great-great aunt before her.  "In the midst of his bereavement one dominant thought obtruded itself.  Something sensational and real had at last come into his life" (p.292) and for this fatal lack of a sense of proper values he is punished by universal disbelief and condemnation as "'Not the right thing to be Munchausening in a time of sorrow'" (p.293).²¹

In "The Seventh Pullet" Blenkinthrope requires to be coached in the art of Munchausening.  Not so the Baroness in "Esmé" as she recounts her hunting story to Clovis.²²  At first all the hallmarks of a typical hunting story are there.  As Clovis remarks, "'In every fox-hunting story that I've ever heard there's been a fox and some gorse-bushes'" (p.102).²³  But not for long, for the Baroness, unperturbed by this interruption, continues her tale which reflects poorly on her stultifying companion, Constance Broddle, whose main contribution is a series of asinine questions.  An extraordinary wild beast comes into view, identified by the Baroness as a hyena which has probably escaped from Lord Pabham's Park.

The hounds in pursuit of this unlikely quarry behave as ineptly as the hounds in "The Lost Sanjak"²⁴ and disappear leaving Constance and the Baroness alone in the gloaming with the hyena.  To Constance's remark that they cannot spend all night with the hyena, the Baroness acidly retorts, "'I don't know what your ideas of comfort are [...] but I shouldn't think of staying here all night even without a hyaena'" (p.103), deliberately misunderstanding the plodding Constance who is clearly no match for her.  They trot off towards "the Crowley road" (p.103)²⁵ followed by the hyena whom the Baroness dubs Esmé as a convenient name for a beast of indeterminate gender, on their way passing a gipsy child who is devoured by Esmé despite attempts to stop it.  Without any evidence of genuine upset, the Baroness says, "'This part of the story I always hurry over, because it is really rather horrible'" (p.104).

The doltish Constance with "another of her futile questions" (p.104) asks, "'How can you let that ravening beast²⁶ trot by your side?'" (p.104) as if she herself is somehow exempt from all blame.  When they reach the road, Esmé is promptly knocked down by a passing motorist, whereupon the Baroness affects grief and requests that he bury the hyena at once.  "'Evidently hasty roadside interments were contingencies that had been provided against'" (p.105), remarks the Baroness sardonically to Clovis in her narration of events.

Playing on the young man's obvious contrition, she refuses offers of reparation, "'but as he persisted I let him have my address'" (p.105), this deviousness netting her "'a charming little diamond brooch, with the name Esmé set in a sprig of rosemary'" (p.105).  The unsentimental Baroness promptly sells it, refusing to share any of the proceeds with Constance, whose friendship she forfeits without regret.

There are no repercussions either from Lord Pabham who "'never advertised the loss of his hyaena'" (p.105), having had to pay compensation for sheep-worrying and poultry-thieving when a herbivorous animal escaped two years previously; or from the gipsies who "'were equally unobtrusive over their missing offspring'" (p.105).  As the Baroness cynically remarks, "'I don't suppose in large encampments they really know to a child or two how many they've got'" (p.105).

Clovis more than matches this wild tale in "The Story of St Vespaluus", a fable in satirical vein told in answer to a plea from the Baroness for a story "'just true enough to be interesting and not true enough to be tiresome'" (p.166).  The hero very much resembles Clovis in being '"not at all displeased at the attention which was being centred on him" (p.170) as well as in the description of his physical appearance.  "He had an elegant, well-knit figure, a healthy complexion, eyes the colour of very ripe mulberries and dark hair, smooth and very well cared for"' (p.168) which, the Baroness observes, "'sounds like a description of what you imagine yourself to have been like at the age of sixteen'" (p.168).

The story hinges on the defection of Vespaluus from Pagan to Christian worship and the punishment devised for him.  The evil-tempered King Hkrikros, whose heir he is, decrees that he is to be slung naked over three beehives and stung to death, "'a most elegant death'" (p.169) as the obsequious Librarian remarks.  Conveniently for Vespaluus, the royal beekeeper, himself a Christian sympathiser and fond of the boy, painstakingly removes all the bee stings so that Vespaluus emerges unscathed from his ordeal and is acclaimed a saint because of this "publicly-witnessed miracle" (p.171).  If the Baroness is superior in intelligence to the prosaic Constance in "Esmé", Clovis is clearly smarter than the Baroness, as her interjection, '"I didn't know you could take the sting from a live bee"' (p.170) would seem to indicate.  The final irony of the story is that Vespaluus has remained Pagan throughout, pretending to be Christian to annoy his Uncle Hkrikros, which is why, says Clovis, "in spite of the popular veneration for his sanctity, he never received official canonization" (p.173).

Ingenious torture in this case fails and the unwholesome Vespaluus triumphs over the followers of conventionally accepted forms of religion.  The fable satirises, as so many of the stories do, the hollowness at the heart of religious beliefs, the petty corruptions beneath the outward show.  Here again is fantasy, glibness, shock and inventiveness, and Clovis has proved himself to be the equal in Munchausening to the Baroness.

"Shock Tactics"

From these tall stories it is but a short step to the hoaxes for which Saki is celebrated.  The earliest practical joke, which appears to be more the effect of high spirits than the later, more purposeful tricks played by Clovis and the rest, occurs in "Reginald's Choir Treat".  A vicar's daughter, with the approval of Reginald's family, has been trying to reform him, but the earnest Amabel²⁷ is no match for the flippant young man who plays mercilessly upon her serious intentions.

She is sufficiently unimaginative to suggest that he help her to organise the choir boys' annual outing whereupon "his eyes shone with the dangerous enthusiasm of a convert" (p.17), which conveys to the reader a sense of anticipation and ought to have warned the ingenuous Amabel.  When she is indisposed with a chill, "Reginald called it a dispensation; it had been the dream of his life to stage-manage a choir outing" (p.18).  He is both calculating and an inspired opportunist, a combination reminiscent of Nicholas in "The Lumber-Room".  He leads his young charges to a stream to bathe and refuses to return their clothes to them.²⁸  Then he insists on their processing thus unclad through the village to a musical accompaniment.  "Forethought had provided the occasion with a supply of tin whistles, but the introduction of a he-goat [...] was a brilliant afterthought" (p.18).  For this "Bacchanalian procession" (p.18) he chooses a deliberately inappropriate temperance hymn, the temperance movement being a familiar target for Reginald's pranks.

While Reginald may have enjoyed the temporary indulgence of his sense of fun, remaining "discreetly in the background" (p.18) does not protect him.  His "family never forgave him.  They had no sense of humour" (p.18).  He must, however, have considered it worth the cost for, irrepressible as ever in "Reginald's Christmas Revel", he livens up a tedious Christmas party in a manner calculated to give maximum offence and resulting in his banishment from the Babwolds' house-party on Boxing Day.²⁹

Having created minor havoc in a succession of incidents throughout the evening, Reginald "invented a headache and retired from the scene" (p.34).  A fellow guest, the redoubtable "Miss Langshan-Smith [...] who always got up at some uncomfortable hour in the morning" (p.34), has pinned to her door "a signed request" (p.34) that she be called early in the morning.  Just as he saw the possibilities of the choir outing, Reginald sees this as equally providential.  "Such an opportunity does not come twice in a lifetime" (p.35) Reginald observes and covers up the message with a suicide note expressing regret for "a misspent life" (p.35) and requesting "a military funeral" (p.35).  Preposterous though this is, when, "a few minutes later I violently exploded an air-filled paper bag on the landing, and gave a stage moan that could have been heard in the cellars" (p.35), the house guests charge upstairs while Reginald effects his retreat.  The picture which Saki paints of the formidable spinster being "searched [.  .  .] for bullets for about a quarter of an hour, as if she had been a historic battlefield" (p.35) is typically and gloriously absurd.

Markedly similar is the culminating jape perpetrated by Adrian in the eponymous story.  Despite Lucas Croyden's warnings to his aunt, Susan Mebberley, who "was a charming woman, but she was also an aunt" (p.141) not to take Adrian under her wing, Lucas realises that she will ignore the advice because she "was a woman as well as an aunt" (p.142).  The escalation of Adrian's escapades is reflected in the letters from progressively more remote hotels in the Swiss Alps, sent by Clovis who, conveniently, is one of the party.  As he relates, "'nothing unduly outrageous happened till last night'" (p.143) when Adrian changes over all the numbers on the bedroom doors and "'transferred the bathroom label to the adjoining bedroom door" (p.143) with predictable results.³⁰

In this story of irrepressible high spirits Susan Mebberley certainly learns the hard way that she should have listened to Lucas, and yet the flavour of the story is more the celebration of youthful irresponsibility than a sophisticated practical joke or some well-laid stratagem.  In the case of "The Boar-Pig", however, a new element is introduced.

Of the practical jokes designed to punish, as usual there are two main targets, the bossy or manipulative woman and the weak or stupid man.  A prime example of the former is Mrs Stosssen in "The Boar-Pig" who, with her dull daughter, is bent on gate-crashing a garden party at which "the Princess" (p.246)³¹ is to be present.  They reckon without the thirteen year-old daughter of the house, Matilda Cuvering, however, who first releases a boar-pig which blocks their retreat and then engages them to their discomfiture in French until, after extorting a suitable ransom, she lures the pig away so that they can make their escape.³²  Matilda, reminiscent of her namesake in Belloc's poem,³³ appears only in this story³⁴ but has close affinities with Vera who, either generically, or specifically as Vera Durmot visiting a long succession of aunts,³⁵ acts in a manner worthy of Clovis to unsettle the complacent or disconcert the pretentious.

Despite the Stossen's "furtive haste mingled with the stateliness of their advance" (p.246) past the walled gooseberry garden,³⁶ "the alert eyes" (p.246) of Matilda who is perched in her medlar tree detect their progress and she releases the pig which regards them impassively from "small red eyes" (p.247) to their great consternation.  They make shooing noises which evoke the comment from the hitherto unobserved Matilda, "'if they think they're going to drive him away by reciting lists of the kings of Israel and Judah³⁷ they're laying themselves out for disappointment'" (p.247).  As with all of Saki's juvenile protagonists Matilda is superior to the adults on several levels.  She is literally superior in her position above them looking down,³⁸ she is able to direct events, and she is clearly cleverer and better educated too.  Having forced them to reveal an ineptitude in French, and, despite their extreme reluctance, to part with money, she proceeds to lure the pig away with an ease which compounds their feeling of foolishness.  The loss to their dignity is considerable.

Blackmail worked wonders for Matilda and blackmail is Mrs Heasant's reward in "Shock Tactics" too.  Bertie Heasant's mother is "one of those empty-minded individuals to whom other people's affairs are perpetually interesting" (p.497) to the extent that she opens her son's private correspondence.  Bertie confides his problem to Clovis who writes a series of letters each more improbable and incriminating than the last, which the sensation-loving Mrs Heasant believes implicitly despite all Bertie's protests of innocence.  When she discovers "'it's all been a stupid hoax'" (p.499), she promises never to open his mail again, "willing to pay hush-money" (p.499) in being "conscious of the fact that she would look rather ridiculous if the story got about" (p.499).  Again it is an appeal to social rather than ethical considerations which prevails.

In "The Schartz-Metterklume Method", called by Fogle, "Saki's most famous practical joke",³⁹ the unusual element is the age and standing of the joker, the mature yet high-spirited Lady Carlotta, who, though clearly a woman with a mind of her own, has a sense of humour to temper her imperiousness.⁴⁰  She has shown herself to be a right-minded person by her intervention on behalf of a maltreated animal, which is the reason for her having missed her train.  In being accused by the upstart Mrs Quabarl of being "'Miss Hope, the governess'", Lady Carlotta agrees, "'Very well, if I must I must' [...] with dangerous meekness" (p.284).⁴¹

Mrs Quabarl continues to play into Lady Carlotta's hands at every turn by her pretentiousness and insistence that "'in their history lessons, for instance, you must try to make them feel that they are being introduced to the life-stories of men and women who really lived'" (p.284); so that when she finds her children being required to re-enact the Rape of the Sabine Women she has only herself to blame.  Mr Quabarl is merely an echo of his domineering wife (like Egbert in "The Reticence of Lady Anne"), and no match for Lady Carlotta in her deliberate misunderstandings and opinions designed to shock.

Forced to intervene on behalf of her beleaguered offspring Mrs Quabarl is reduced to the acid observation, "'You may be very clever and modern, Miss Hope [...]⁴² but I should like you to leave here by the next train'" (p.287).  But Lady Carlotta has yet one more card to play, informing Mrs Quabarl that she would be grateful if that lady would take care of her (imaginary) luggage for her - luggage which in typical Saki fashion includes a half-grown leopard cub.  The irony throughout this story is that the putative Miss Hope in the subservient role of governess is plainly superior in every way to Mrs Quabarl, her supposed employer, and this reversal of the accepted order of things draws attention to the essentially inferior nature of the Quabarls and their bogus gentility.

Occasionally a trick is played in self-defence as in "Fate" where Rex Dillot is in an impossibly tight spot having gambled money which he hasn't got on a billiard game which is heading for disaster.  He deliberately sets fire to the bedding of the overbearing Teresa Thundleford who is having a post-prandial nap, so that he can bundle her up, rush to the billiard room, and deposit her unceremoniously on the billiard table.  "The promptitude and energy of the rescue had prevented any great damage being done [...] The billiard table had suffered most" (p.487).  As the incorrigible and loyal Clovis says in Rex's defence, "When one is rushing about with a blazing woman in one's arms one can't stop to think out exactly where one is going to put her" (p.487), the irony being, of course, that only Clovis has seen through the ruse.

Clovis uses a trick in his own interests in "The Stampeding of Lady Bastable".  His mother has used all her wiles on the intractable Lady Bastable to persuade her to put Clovis up for the six days Mrs Sangrail intends to spend visiting the MacGregors, presumably in Scotland.  She will thereby save his train fare and have a few days' respite from his unpredictable behaviour.  The "sleepy comfortable voice" (p.119) which she generally uses to lull people into thinking that what she is asking is of little consequence has no effect on Lady Bastable, who recalls the time that Clovis stayed with her for a week.  To his mother's protest that "'he was younger then'" (p.119) his hostess retorts, "'But he hasn't improved [...] it's no use growing older if you only learn new ways of misbehaving yourself'" (p.119).⁴³

Bribery prevails, however, where wheedling has failed and Clovis is presented with a fait accompli when he comes down to breakfast.  Responding to the news that he has been invited to stay on at Lady Bastable's he "said suitable things in a highly unsuitable manner" (p.119) which contrasts with his usual trick of saying shocking things in a polite way.

His mother watches him covertly "from behind ostentatiously sleepy lids" (p.120) masking her anxiety about his reactions.  She has not long to wait.  No sooner has she gone upstairs to oversee her packing and Lady Bastable is ensconced in the morning-room than Clovis rushes into the kitchen shouting randomly, "'Poor Lady Bastable! In the morning-room! Oh, quick!"' (p.120), and the startled servants in pell-mell procession dash off, the rear being brought up by a gardener with a sickle in his hand which adds to the effectiveness of the trick.  This rabble then, led by Clovis shouting absurdly, "'The jacquerie!⁴⁴  They’re on us!'" (p.120), plunges through the morning-room towards Lady Bastable, who bolts in terror out of the french window and runs "well and far across the lawn before the eyes of her astonished retainers" (p.121).  Naturally this complete loss of face does not render Clovis dear to her and the lunch "was served in a frigid stateliness that might have been framed on a Byzantine model" (p.121).⁴⁵  Clovis by his wild hoax gets his own way and profits from teaching the MacGregor boys "who could well afford the knowledge, how to play poker-patience" (p.120).

He plays a similar trick in "The Hen".  When Mrs Sangrail invites Dora Bittholz to stay, Clovis points out that Jane Martlet's visit will overlap since she is renowned for overstaying her allotted time.  Unfortunately "a hen came between them" (p.255)⁴⁶ and Clovis feels that the problem is not so much that they are not on speaking terms but "'on the contrary, the difficulty will be to get them to leave off'" (p.255), a fine example of "partial expression".⁴⁷  "'Nothing short of a miracle would make Jane leave'" (p 255) before her fortnight is up, laments Clovis's mother to which Clovis replies with justification, "'Miracles are rather in my line'" (p.255).

But this particular miracle seems destined for failure since every ruse Clovis tries is met with a stolid refusal to be dislodged.  Even being told that Sturridge, the butler, is intent on murdering her merely causes her to remark, "'It's a dreadful situation to be in, with a mad butler dangling over you like the sword of What's-his-name⁴⁸, but I'm certainly not going to cut my visit short'" (p.258), an unconscious pun which underlines her obtuseness.  It inspires Clovis, however, to ask Sturridge to carry a ceremonial sword into the morning-room where Jane is writing letters, telling him that she wants to copy the inscription on the hilt.  The recent conversation with Clovis combined with the sight of the armed butler advancing towards her is enough to cause even Jane to flee.  

The miracle proves unnecessary in the event since Dora postpones her visit but it is some consolation to Clovis to have the distinction of holding "the record as the only human being who ever hustled Jane Martlet out of the time-table of her migrations" (p.259),⁴⁹ an achievement possibly on a par with the Guild of the Poor Dear Souls and their nearly reforming a washerwoman in "Reginald's Drama"( p.29).  To Clovis and his like in any case, it is the excitement of the chase that matters.

In "Excepting Mrs Pentherby", a story which Inglis suggests "no hostess should be without",⁵⁰ Reggie Bruttle appears to attain the impossible too.  He has inherited a house which "might easily languish in the estate market for years, set round with notice-boards proclaiming it, in the eyes of a sceptical world to be an eminently desirable residence" (p.466) as Saki remarks with cynical insight.  Reggie thinks, however, that "good management and a little unobtrusive hard work" (p.466) will ensure the success of the prolonged house-party "consisting of young or youngish people of both sexes, too poor to be able to do much hunting or shooting on a serious scale" (p.466) but with ambitions to do so.  He proposes that each should be "on the footing" (p.466) not of "paying guest" but "paying host" (p.466).

This shows a marked understanding of human nature, and the warning by Major Dagberry that his scheme will fail on the grounds that a woman will "'go without things to a heroic extent, but the one luxury she will not go without is her quarrels'" (p.466) proves unfounded.  Mrs Pentherby who "exposed little weaknesses" (p.467) and who "did, and said, horrible things in a matter-of-fact innocent way, and [...] did, and said, matter-of-fact innocent things in a horrible way" (pp.467-68),⁵¹ contrives to unite the forces of hatred against her own person.  

The cunning Reggie has introduced her "for the express purpose of concentrating the feuds and quarrelling" (p.469), a role which suited her perfectly as an antidote to being the "poor relation in a rather pugnacious family [whose] life has been largely spent in smoothing over other people's quarrels" (p.470).  As a student of human nature Reggie ranks with Clovis and Vera, his "good management" and "unobtrusive hard work" guaranteeing the success of his ploy and fulfilling the requirements of ingenuity and thoroughness.

Another of Clovis's miracles occurs in "The She-Wolf".  As in so many other stories, the lack of thoroughness is seen to be the justification for the victim's downfall.  In "The Lost Sanjak", for instance, it is "lack of specialisation" that is regretted, in "Dusk" it is the want of a piece of soap.  It is for "his dabblings in the unseen" (p.235) that Leonard Bilsiter is to be punished, both on account of the presumption he betrays (a quality shared by Mrs De Ropp, Sylvia Seltoun and Thirza Yealmton among others) and in his superficiality, a trait which is universally deplored in Saki's stories.

Added to Leonard's fatal sense of self-importance which makes him "oppressively reticent⁵² about certain dark mysteries, which he alluded to under the resounding title of Siberian Magic" (p.236) when he is normally "garrulous" (p.236),⁵³ there is the further irritation of "his aunt, Cecilia Hoops, who loved sensation perhaps rather better than she loved the truth" (p.236).⁵⁴  This weakness of hers which again is prevalent throughout the stories contributes significantly to his downfall.

As Saki ironically observes, Leonard's reputation "as a wonder-worker or a charlatan" (p.236) has preceded him to Mary Hampton's house-party where he is a guest.  This party comprises the usual social mix: Colonel Hampton who is typically obtuse and choleric, the earnest Mavis Pellington, the foolish Mrs Hoops, and Clovis, but with the interesting addition of Lord Pabham who owns a menagerie,⁵⁵ and the sporting hostess.

Although to a degree the reader is privy to the practical joke, the pleasure in the story is not thereby diminished, Clovis's masterly ingenuity and the reactions of the guests more than compensating for any lack of surprise element.  In claiming for himself miraculous powers with the vociferous backing of his aunt, Leonard prompts his hostess to say, "'I wish you would turn me into a wolf, Mr Bilsiter'" (p.236).  The astonished response from her husband, "'I never knew you had a craving in that direction'" (p.236), neatly divides the company into the knowing and the gullible which is consistent with what is to follow.

Leonard, in order to protect himself from exposure as a fraud, adopts a lofty moral stance which is to be his undoing.  "'In our present imperfect understanding of these hidden forces I think one should approach them with humbleness rather than mockery'" (p.237) he intones.⁵⁶  The fact that Clovis "had sat unusually silent during the discussion on the possibilities of Siberian magic" (p.237) is a clear warning that he is formulating a plan.

With the help of Lord Pabham who is to provide a she-wolf by the name of Louisa, Clovis is going to substitute the animal for his hostess after dinner the following day.  Leonard's aunt unwittingly provides the perfect opening.  Not content with listening to Leonard expatiating about his command "of unseen forces and untested powers" (pp.237-38), "her sensation-loving soul hankered after something more dramatic than mere vocal demonstration" (p.238) and she implores him to "'do something to convince them of your powers'" (p.238).

Taking this as her cue, Mary Hampton goes into the conservatory to feed her macaws and as she disappears from view dares Leonard to turn her into a wolf.  In true supernatural style, "a breath of chill air seemed to rush across the room, and at the same time the macaws broke forth into ear-splitting screams" (p.238), the natural explanation for which becomes clear later.  As Lord Pabham's wolf emerges, consternation understandably ensues, and Leonard's protests that he cannot remedy the situation and his disavowal of all responsibility for Mary's transformation into a wolf do nothing to calm the situation.

Clovis as usual appears to dwell on the least important aspect of the crisis while yet managing to take maximum advantage of it.  "'Of course we must accept your assurance that you didn't turn Mrs Hampton into a wolf', said Clovis politely, 'but you will agree that appearances are against you'" (p.239).⁵⁷  After a suitable interval Lord Pabham lures Louisa out of the room by tossing a lump of sugar to her,⁵⁸ and the assembled throng in expectation of further sensational revelations dashes to the conservatory to see if there are any traces of Mary Hampton.

"'The door is locked on the inside!'"(p.240) exclaims Clovis, having locked it as he speaks.  Thus the inrush of cold air before the emergence of the wolf from the conservatory is explained, the wolf obviously having been introduced by that door, to the understandable alarm of the macaws.  There follows a ludicrous discussion about the proprieties of being "chaperoned by a wolf" (p.240) until Mary Hampton's abrupt reappearance on the scene, complaining, "'Some one has mesmerized me [...]; I found myself in the game larder, of all places'" (p.240).  Only Saki would have dreamt up so appropriate a location and the manner of drawing attention to it by the phrase, "of all places".⁵⁹  She continues, in a manner which shows her to be thoroughly in the Clovis mould, "'being fed with sugar by Lord Pabham.  I hate being mesmerized, and the doctor has forbidden me to touch sugar'" (p.240), as if the two are of equal significance and on the same plane.  Saki hereby casts doubt on the esoteric vogues of the day while adding to the absurdity of the situation.  Her feigned belief in Leonard's magical powers elicits only another disconsolate disclaimer.  And Clovis assumes that mantle for himself.  Rubbing salt into Leonard's wound he says, "'One does not care to speak about these strange powers, but once in a way, when one hears a lot of nonsense being talked about them, one is tempted to show what Siberian magic can accomplish in the hands of some one who really understands it'" (p.241).  Never has a boastful, feeble man been so comprehensively routed.  As Cheikin states in her interesting study, Saki uses practical jokes as a means of "demonstrating the incongruity of life, forcing it into the open where it must be seen and recognised."⁶⁰

It is love of sensation which gives rise to the practical joke perpetrated on Mr Scarrick's shoppers in "Quail Seed" too.  In lamenting to his new tenants, an artist and his sister, that his suburban grocery business cannot compete with the fashionable London stores, he recruits unexpected allies.  They advise him that, since he cannot give the customer something for nothing, he should "appeal to another instinct, which dominates not only the woman shopper but the male shopper - in fact, the entire human race" (pp.452-53).

When asked what that might be, the answer is given obliquely in the next paragraph.  Mrs Greyes and Miss Fritten having missed the train to Town decide to do their shopping at Scarrick's.  "It would not be sensational, they agreed, but it would still be shopping" (p.453).  This is all the encouragement that the artist and his sister need to enact a fantastic melodrama which attracts customers from miles around.  All manner of wild speculations are provoked concerning the significance of the quail seed and the jaffa oranges, the role of the bearded stranger and the foreign-looking youth, while Mr Scarrick's blatant lies evoke the bathetic response from one of the lady shoppers, "'I shall never again be able to believe what he tells me about the absence of colouring matter in the jam'" (p.455), which reveals something of her sense of values.

The eyewitness descriptions of the events and their participants are themselves so various as to be contradictory, saying more about the witnesses themselves than about the events witnessed.  Much is made of eyes and appearances.  The face of the mysterious boy is described as "masked with studied indifference, overspread with ghastly pallor, and blazing with defiance" (p.457).  But there is universal agreement about the bearded stranger's "furtive pacing to and fro" (p.457) "always with his eyes turning to watch the shop entrance" (p.457), a picture of unease which recalls Sophie in "The Byzantine Omelette".

This appeal to the desire for the sensational has paid rich dividends to Mr Scarrick.  It is a different kind of play-acting which takes place in "A Touch of Realism".  In wanting "to have something really original this year" (p.301), Lady Blonze has invited the perfect assortment of guests to her Christmas house-party.  One of them suggests a prolonged charade which results in a kind of cross between "Quail Seed" and "The Schartz-Metterklume Method." Representing the natural victims are the aptly named Blanche Boveal, whose suggestion is adopted as the house-party theme, the pushy but amiably nouveau-riche Klammersteins and the "physically soft and mentally peevish" (p.304) Waldo Plubley.

On the side of the jokers are Bertie van Tahn, Vera Durmot and the hitherto unknown Cyril Skatterly, who "has madness on one side of his family and a Hungarian grandmother on the other" (p.302).  Lady Blonze's husband, Sir Nicholas, has misgivings about the whole affair but his wife overrules him, saying, "'I particularly want to have this idea carried out.  It will be sure to be talked about a lot'" (p.303).  Her husband's ambiguous reply, "'That is quite possible'" (p.303), is borne out at the end of the story when "Lady Blonze's Christmas party was talked about and written about to an extent that she had not anticipated in her most ambitious moments" (p.306), though hardly in the way she desired.  She has, of course, in common with all Saki's imperious women, only herself to blame for the outcome.

"Romance at Short Notice"

Vera acts in conjunction with Skatterly in "A Touch of Realism" but is even more formidable acting on her own initiative.  That "extraordinary fantasia",⁶¹ "The Open Window", has been anatomised by Katrakis⁶² in demonstration of Saki's gift for brevity, but it is worthy of further analysis because it displays so many of the classic ingredients of a typical story in this practical joke category.  The victim is a feeble man; the joker is Vera, a young girl who features in several of these stories representing the child with an adult perception; there is a hint of the supernatural; a dominant aunt figure; dialogue designed to delude and a surprise ending.

The opening sequence, as Katrakis points out, establishes a clear distinction between the "very self-possessed young lady of fifteen" (p.259) and the inept and nervous Framton Nuttel, who flounders around in a doomed attempt to be all things to all women.  Sensing his acute uncertainty Vera mercilessly presses home her advantage.  Under a cloak of polite conversation she establishes the limitations of his knowledge which allow her to play her trick on him.  She is both instinctive and calculating in her approach to him, a characteristic common to feline creatures and typical of Saki's children.  As Otto⁶³ points out, Vera with the apparent innocence of a child is a consummate liar.⁶⁴

"'Do you know many of the people round here?'" (p.260) she asks disingenuously, and having learnt that anything he knows is at second-hand and some four years out of date, Vera spins her fantastic tale about her aunt's "great tragedy" (p.260).  Framton is immediately startled.  "Somehow in this restful country spot tragedies seemed out of place" (p.260), a judgement which calls to mind Crefton Lockyer's initial reaction in "The Peace of Mowsle Barton", and Sylvia's inability to accept the sinister elements around her in "The Music on the Hill".  Vera draws attention to the french windows which Framton reasonably considers to be open for ventilation purposes.  But Vera disregards any such mundane explanation as she embellishes her tale, relating in graphic detail how her aunt's husband, two brothers and dog left through that window three years before to the very day, never to return.  The tension mounts as she describes the tragedy and her own "'creepy feeling that they will all walk in through that window-'" (p.261).

On that note she breaks off with a theatrical shudder just as her aunt, Mrs Sappleton, enters the room.  This marks a turning point in the story.  The slow, sinister, eerie build up of atmosphere is replaced by the brisk, matter-of-fact tone of the aunt who apologises to Framton for being late and hopes that "'Vera has been amusing you?'" (p.261), a conventional pleasantry to be expected from such a hostess.  "'She has been very interesting'" (p.261) replies Framton cagily, but determinedly polite as ever.

As the aunt "rattled on cheerfully" (p.261) about her husband and brothers who have been out shooting and whom she expects to return at any moment, she is sublimely oblivious that "to Framton, it was all purely horrible" (p.261).  More and more convinced that Mrs Sappleton is mad he tries to change the subject but "her eyes were constantly straying past him to the open window and the lawn beyond" (p.261).⁶⁵  In a bid for her attention Framton announces that he is under doctor's orders to avoid all mental and physical exertion.  In labouring "under the tolerably wide-spread delusion that total strangers and chance acquaintances are hungry for the least detail of one's ailments and infirmities" (p.261) and in the barely suppressed yawn which is Mrs Sappleton's reaction to that information, the "flutter, indicative of general boredom" (p.432) which greets Lola's announcement about her dream in "A Bread and Butter Miss" is called to mind.  Observations such as these are what Katrakis perceptively calls 'insights' which illustrate universal truths.⁶⁶

Mrs Sappleton exclaims, "'Here they are at last!'" (p.261) and Framton "turned towards the niece with a look intended to convey sympathetic comprehension" (p.261).  He is appalled, therefore, to see Vera "staring out through the open window with dazed horror in her eyes" (pp.261-62).  When he turns round "in a chill shock of nameless fear" (p.262) he is entirely unmanned at the apparition of three figures walking towards the open window through the gathering dusk, accompanied by the dog all as described by Vera down to the chanting of "'I said, Bertie, why do you bound?'" (p.262).  (It is an interesting detail and typical of Saki that according to Vera the youngest brother chants this song because it irritates the aunt).

The picture of Framton in full flight calls to mind Octavian Ruttle chasing after the children towards the pigsty, or Van Cheele racing to save the Toop child, in its comic absurdity.  Mrs Sappleton's remarks to her husband that the fleeing figure was "'a most extraordinary man'" (p.262) and that "'one would think he had seen a ghost'" (p.262),⁶⁷ give rise to Vera's next flight of fancy.  She relates an impromptu tale which is horrifying in its content and all the more macabre because she tells it "calmly" (p.262).  Dispassionately she comments, "'Enough to make any one lose their nerve'" (p.262).  Her self-possession is as total at the end of the story as at the beginning.  As Saki laconically observes, "Romance at short notice was her speciality" (p.262).

Instead of the supernatural, the joke which Vera Durmot plays on the "rather cheerless, oldish young man" (p.271), Latimer Springfield, in "The Lull", requires the cooperation of a piglet and a cockerel and the invention of a burst reservoir.  "It was the sort of joke I would like to have perpetrated myself," says Tom Sharpe,⁶⁸ and involves mythical boy scouts; a maid who "has already identified three bodies that have floated past the billiard-room window as being the young man she's engaged to" (p.272), which is a pithy portrayal of a certain type of sensation-loving young woman; and the formidably callous Vera who observes, "'Either she's engaged to a large assortment of the population round here or else she's very careless at identification.  Of course it may be the same body coming round again and again'" (p.272).

The aunt is as humourless as "the fairly strenuous plodder" (p.271) for whose welfare she is concerned.  In contriving that Latimer should spend the night with unruly livestock in his bedroom, instead of having peace "for the due marshalling of useful facts and discreet fictions" (p.272), necessary to a prospective Parliamentarian, Vera can with justification claim "'at any rate I kept your mind from dwelling on politics all the night'" (p.275).  As Saki points out in the last sentence, this "was, of course, perfectly true" (p.275), an ironic comment on Latimer's accusation that Vera is a liar.

In "The Unrest-Cure", a practical joke which in Inglis' view is "so spectacular that the victims might later have been proud to be able to boast of suffering from" it,⁶⁹ the "solid, sedate individual, sedately dressed, sedately conversational" (p.127) is a natural target for Clovis.  He even invites his own fate by confessing to his travelling companion in Clovis's hearing, "'I'm not much over forty, but I seem to have settled into a deep groove of elderly middle-age.  My sister shows the same tendency'" (p.127), and proceeds to expand on this theme of disliking change even to the detail of a thrush that has altered its nest-building habits and thereby upset them.⁷⁰

When the friend suggests that the remedy would be an "Unrest-cure" (p.128) Clovis becomes "galvanized into alert attention" (p.128) and makes a note of J.P.  Huddle's address on his shirt cuff.⁷¹  There follows an elaborate hoax in which Clovis single-handedly conjures up the imaginary presence of a Bishop, a Colonel Alberti, and a posse of Boy Scouts, all involved in a plot "'to massacre every Jew in the neighbourhood'" (p.130).  By a series of telegrams which are in themselves sufficiently unusual to occasion Miss Huddle to deviate from "the appointed day for curry" (p.129), Clovis creates the illusion of this dastardly plot and secures the presence at Huddle's house of Sir Leon Birberry, a prominent local Jew, to the consternation of Huddle who can envisage his imminent assassination.  He is later joined by Paul Isaacs who has also been summoned by Clovis's bogus telegram, and Clovis adds to the general chaos by announcing with superb disregard for personal feelings, "'The Boy-scouts mistook my signal, and have killed the postman'" (p.132).⁷²  The housemaid, whose fiancé this was, though understandably distraught, is callously reminded by Huddle, "'your mistress has a headache'" (p.132), albeit an unscheduled one.⁷³  By this shallow self-absorption Huddle forfeits any residual right to sympathy for his present plight and engages the reader wholeheartedly on the side of the devils.

Clovis on occasion shows a gift for unselfish action, notably in "Shock Tactics" where his ingenuity is deployed in his friend's interest, any satisfaction to Clovis being incidental.  In "The Quince Tree" it is the sixteen-year-old Vera who reveals a different side to her nature when she outsmarts her overbearing aunt, Mrs Bebberly Cumble, who is threatening to evict the venerable Betsy Mullen from her cottage because she cannot pay her rent.  Disguising her genuine concern for the old woman under a veil of flippancy, Vera objects that she would have to leave her garden with the quince tree in the corner, "'And she never makes any quince jam; I think to have a quince tree and not to make quince jam shows such strength of character'" (p.326).

Her aunt, impressively dismissive, replies, "'When one is sixteen [...] one talks of things being impossible which are merely uncongenial'" (p.327), adding that the old woman "'has scarcely enough furniture to fill that big cottage'" (p.327).  This prompts Vera after a brief pause for reflection to imply to her aunt that there is more of value in Betsy's cottage than anywhere else in the entire neighbourhood.  There begins a dialogue in which Vera leads her aunt on, Clovis-fashion, deliberately at cross-purposes with her and teasing her into leaping to conclusions.

Her aunt's objection that there can be nothing of value left because Betsy "parted with whatever old china ware she had long ago" (p.327) is interesting for two reasons.  In the first instance it shows that Betsy is genuinely needy and not just the sponger that Vera's aunt portrays in saying of her, "'Betsy Mullen always is in difficulties with her rent, and the more people help her with it the less she troubles about it'" (p.326).  And in the second, it is tempting to wonder whether Mrs Cumble has not acquired the valuable china for herself in lieu of rent at some time.

Vera plays her next card by implying that the goods to which she refers are stolen, adding, "'I don't suppose I ought to tell you'" (p.327) to which her aunt predictably responds, "'You must tell me at once'" (p.327).  Vera's next sally has the effect of confusing Mrs Cumble into a self-contradiction which shows her as ridiculous, pompous and hypocritical, traits which are obvious throughout the story.  "'I'm perfectly certain that I oughtn't to tell you anything about it,' said Vera, 'but then, I often do things I oughtn't to do'" (p.327).⁷⁴  The aunt's predictable reply, that she would "'be the last person to suggest that you should do anything that you ought not'" (p.327) earns the deserved riposte from the impossible Vera that "'I am always swayed by the last person who speaks to me [...] so I'11 do what I ought not to do and tell you'" (p.327).

This play on words is not only amusing but gives Vera the satisfaction of unmasking her aunt's hypocrisy while denying her any cause for self-righteousness.  If Mrs Cumble is to learn anything from Vera, and her curiosity will not permit otherwise, she has to condone Vera's wrong-doing in telling her.  The aunt is invited to believe a fantastic tale in which all manner of respectable people are involved, not the least important of whom is her prospective son-in-law, Cuthbert.

At no time does Vera say exactly what is supposed to have been stolen but allows her aunt to draw her own conclusions, and, by dwelling on "'the frightfully good match, and that he's your ideal of what a son-in-law ought to be'" (p.329), she secures rent-free accommodation for Betsy "'with soup twice a week and my aunt's doctor to see her whenever she has a finger ache'"(p.329).  In recounting the tale to a close friend she admits that she "'invented'" (p.329) the part about the stolen jewels.

Vera may be the mistress of "romance at short notice" but in "The Forbidden Buzzards" Clovis demonstrates that he "believed that if a lie was worth telling it was worth telling well" (p.331).  His friend Hugo Peterby who hopes to marry Betty Coulterneb enlists Clovis's help in keeping Hugo's rival out of the way long enough to propose to her.

Their hostess, Mrs Olston, on the other hand, is equally intent on effecting a match between Betty and the "heartbreakingly rich" (p.330) Lanner, so that Clovis has to employ all his wiles to prevent her throwing the couple together.  This he does, in a manner similar to Vera's in "The Quince Tree", by inviting her to believe that Lanner plans to steal the eggs of "the rough-legged buzzards" (p.331), which Mrs Olston immediately identifies as "almost the only pair known to be breeding in the whole of Great Britain" (p.331), and left as a kind of sacred trust to her care by her absent husband.

When Clovis suggests picketing, Mrs Olston understandably thinks he means "'setting guards round the birds'" (p.332) but Clovis corrects her.  "'No; round Lanner'" (p.332),⁷⁵ and this is duly accomplished on a rota system by his hostess Mrs Olston, by the fourteen year old Evelyn who "talked chiefly about good and evil" (p.332),⁷⁶ nine year old Jack, and a German governess.  It was a pity after such a display of ingenuity that Hugo did not succeed in his proposal and even sadder that "the buzzards successfully reared two young ones, which were shot by a local hairdresser" (p.333), but there can be no doubt that to Clovis the fun he has had in disrupting the orderly house party would be compensation enough.

"An Emergency Brain"

Clovis and Vera often act out of a sense of pure mischief or on occasion to help out a friend.  Not so Mrs Packletide in "Mrs Packletide's Tiger".⁷⁷  When she plays an elaborate trick which misfires, she compounds it with a lie which lays the perfect foundation for blackmail.  Curiously, despite being told that "in a world that is supposed to be chiefly swayed by hunger and by love Mrs Packletide was an exception; her movements and motives were largely governed by dislike of Loona Bimberton" (p.115), there is a certain amount of sympathy for her in her tiger-hunting enterprise which is designed to improve on her arch-enemy's recent aviational triumph.  Certainly Mrs Packletide is one of Clovis’s set, featuring in several other stories.⁷⁸

Perhaps it is the word "supposed" which provides the key.  She is aware of her feelings about Loona and does not attempt to conceal them.  The lunch which she intends to give "ostensibly in Loona Bimberton's honour, with a tiger-skin rug occupying most of the foreground and all of the conversation" (p.115) is meant to fool nobody but Loona.

Mrs Packletide herself is not above the use of bribery and the "thousand rupees for the opportunity of shooting a tiger without over-much risk or exertion" (p.116) has procured the cooperation of the villagers in leaving about "the cheaper kinds of goats [...] with elaborate carelessness" (p.116) to lure an aging tiger.  The weak link in the plot proves to be the paid companion, Louisa Mebbin, who combines "a morbid dread of performing an atom more service than she had been paid for" (p.116) with "a protective elder-sister attitude towards money" (p.116).  Thus it was she "who drew attention to the fact that the goat was in death-throes from a mortal bullet-wound, while no trace of the rifle's deadly work could be found on the tiger" (p.117).  "Evidently the wrong animal had been hit" (p.117) the tiger dying of fright, but the villagers are happy with their hush money and "gladly connived at the fiction that she [Mrs Packletide] had shot the beast" (p.117).  Saki adds laconically, "'and Miss Mebbin was a paid companion'" (p.117), the full significance of which proves doubly ironic later.

The celebrations take place as planned and Mrs Packletide gilds the lily by going "to the County Costume Ball in the character of Diana" (p.117).  It is only a few days after the ball that Mrs Packletide's bubble of triumph is burst when Louisa Mebbin says, "'How amused every one would be if they knew what really happened'" (p.118).  When challenged to explain, Louisa Mebbin does not prevaricate.  "With her disagreeably pleasant laugh" (p.118) she replies, "'How you shot the goat and frightened the tiger to death'" (p.118).  Her succinct and uncompromising answer lends her a kind of moral superiority in sharp contrast to Mrs Packletide's blustering "'no one would believe it'" (p.118).  Louisa's perfect reply that "'Loona Bimberton would'" (p.118) is more than enough for Mrs Packletide and in an unaccustomed role of suppliant she begs, "'You surely wouldn't give me away?'" (p.118).⁷⁹

Louisa Mebbin answers "with seeming irrelevance" (p.118) that there is "'a week-end cottage near Dorking that I should rather like to buy'" (p.118), the only oblique answer she has given.  She has named her price and as "paid companion" she is granted it.  There is a fine irony in the name "Les Fauves" (p.118)⁸⁰ which she gives to her cottage "with its garden borders of tiger-lilies" (p.118).  Speculation among her friends as to its acquisition is clearly rife since they think, "'It is a marvel how Louisa manages to do it'" (p.118).  Mrs Packletide, having paid a bribe in the first instance and blackmail in the last remains diplomatically reticent to the end, intimating that she has given up big game hunting because "'the incidental expenses are so heavy'" (p.118).  She has paid in order to put Loona out of countenance; she has also paid Louisa to save face.  Mrs Packletide's tiger has turned out to be Louisa Mebbin.

Another instance of 'the biter bit' is in what Pritchett calls "the shattering absurdity of 'Louis'"⁸¹ in which the manipulative Lena Strudwarden is outmanoeuvred by her husband, aided and abetted by his sister Elsie.  Strudwarden wants to visit Vienna for Easter while Lena favours Brighton as usual.  First of all Lena speciously objects that Vienna would be expensive, but Strudwarden is not deceived and speaks feelingly about the "meaningless luncheon parties" (p.414) he would have to endure.  "Lena Strudwarden maintained an equally feeling silence" (p.415) before her usual excuse about the difficulties arising from taking her pet dog, Louis, on holiday and the impossibility of leaving him behind.

Just as in "The Reticence of Lady Anne", all the clues that justify the surprise ending are present.  Louis is described as "snug and irresponsive" (p.415), Strudwarden remarks, "'It isn't as if you were in the least bit fond of animals'" (p.415),⁸² "'you snatched him away from old Lady Peterby the other day'" (p.416), "'all that I ever see of him is the tip of his unhealthy-looking little nose'" (p.416) and so on.  But Lena, who acts like someone with "a beautifully meek nature, who would, however, send the whole world to the stake sooner than yield an inch where she knew herself to be in the right" (p.415) is immovable.  Clearly she has many of the characteristics of Thirza Yealmton in "The Holy War".

Strudwarden's sister is quite forthright about the solution to his problem.  "'You must get rid of that dog [...] it must be helped to some sudden and merciful end'" (p.416).  He admits that the same idea has occurred to him but that "'it's not very easy, though, to arrange a fatality for a creature that spends most of its time in a muff or asleep'" (p.417).  Elsie, however, has the perfect plan down to the last detail, of putting Louis, kennel and all, into a box and gassing him.  But when they lift the lid of the box, "Louis sat at the door of his dwelling, head erect and ears pricked, as coldly and defiantly inert as when they had put him into his execution chamber" (p.418).  Strudwarden is so startled that he drops the kennel and looks hard at "the miracle-dog" (p.418); "then he went into a peal of chattering laughter" (p.418) (like Georg in "The Interlopers").  Lena's secret is out: "It was certainly a wonderful imitation of a truculent-looking toy Pomeranian" (p.418).

But the story has a final twist, for Strudwarden tells Lena that Louis has had to be destroyed for biting the butcher's boy and that the money which would have gone to buy her an Easter present will have to be paid to the boy in compensation.  Not content with that he insists that she accompany him "'to Vienna to consult Dr Schroeder who is a specialist on dogbites'" (p.418); and the final crowning irony, "'I have sent what remains of Louis to Rowland Ward⁸³ to be stuffed; that will be my Easter gift to you instead of the buckles'".  It is no wonder, therefore ,that Lena's "attempt at laughing was an unmistakeable failure" (p.418).  Strudwarden has very cleverly and completely called Lena's bluff.  If she calls Strudwarden a liar, she condemns herself.

The tables are very neatly turned on the greedy and mean Smithly-Dubbs in "The Phantom Luncheon" too, a story in which another favourite device of Saki's is employed, that of mistaken identity combined in this case with pretended amnesia.  In being asked by her husband, Sir James, to invite them somewhere exclusive for lunch because they are politically useful at election times, Lady Drakmanton protests, "'I consider that showing hospitality to the Smithly-Dubbs is carrying Free Food principles to a regrettable extreme'" (p.428).

She implores her sister Milly to stand in for her, since "'people say that we are so alike that they can hardly tell us apart'" (p.428), but is turned down since Milly has a luncheon engagement of her own at the Carlton the following day.  In reflecting to herself, "'It shall be rather an amusing lunch-party'" (p.428), Lady Drakmanton whets the reader's appetite for what is to come.  The following day finds Lady Drakmanton in the lobby of her club where she knows the Smithly-Dubbs will be waiting "with their tongues hanging out of their mouths and the six-course look in their eyes" (p.428), but her appearance has been so dramatically changed that the Misses Smithly-Dubb are clearly a little unsure about her identity.

Greed, however, prevails as she asks them "'What is the Carlton like for lunching in?'" (p.429) and on their "enthusiastic recommendation" (p.429) suggests that they go and lunch there.  Throughout the extravagant meal Lady Drakmanton responds non-committally to all political allusions until "with a scared look around her" (p.430) she confesses "'I'm suffering from a complete loss of memory'" (p.430).  The only thing she can remember is "you asking me to come and lunch with you here, and that I accepted your kind invitation'" (p.430) at which "the scared look was transferred with intensified poignancy to the faces of her companions" (p.430).

Her timing is perfect for just as the Smithly-Dubbs are assuring her that she is Lady Drakmanton, their attention is drawn to Milly, the look-alike sister, who is just entering the room.  "The uneasiness in their eyes deepened into horror.  In outward appearance the lady [...] certainly came rather nearer to their recollection of their Member's wife than the individual who was sitting at table with them" (p.430), appearances as always deceiving, and the choice of the word, "individual" conveying their new-found distaste.  The eyes again have an important role to play, in the case of the victims, betraying their true emotions, and in the jokers, as a means of masking them.

To compound their horror, Lady Drakmanton now 'rediscovers' a mythical identity, that of the humble "'Ellen Niggle, of the Ladies' Brass-polishing Guild'" (p.430).  In common with Laploshka they are snobbish as well as mean.⁸⁴  "To have fed themselves liberally at their own expense was, perhaps, an extravagance to be deplored [...], to have drawn an unknown and socially unremunerative Ellen Niggle into the net of their hospitality was a catastrophe that they could not contemplate with any degree of calmness" (p.431).

Mrs Packletide is determined to outdo Loona Bimberton, Lady Drakmanton turns the tables on the Smithly-Dubbs and in "The Occasional Garden" it is the boastful Gwenda Pottingdon who is due for a fall.  The garrulous Elinor Rapsley in her breathless adjuration to the Baroness,⁸⁵ "'Don't talk to me about town gardens [...] which means, of course, that I want you to listen to me for an hour or so while I talk about nothing else'" (p.505), reveals a sense of humour and a self-knowledge unusual in Saki's portrayal of women.  She continues to enlarge on the subject for the next fifty lines of the story, impelled by the imminent arrival of a self-invited lunch guest, the insufferably smug Gwenda whose garden, like everything else about her, is "the envy of the neighbourhood" (p.506).  Elinor says of her disparagingly, "'When her eldest child was confirmed it was such a sensational event, according to her account of it, that one almost expected questions to be asked about it in the House of Commons'" (p.506).

The Baroness, however, has the perfect solution in the shape of the "O.O.S.A.", that is, "The Occasional Oasis Supply Association" (p.506), who can provide instant gardens.  Since it is Gwenda Pottingdon, the "envy of the neighbourhood" (p.506) who is to be impressed the "emergency E.O.N. service" (p.507) with something "like a miracle out of the Arabian Nights" (p.507) could be conjured up to grace Elinor's humble back yard.  Readily persuaded and gleefully seeing the possibilities of such an arrangement, Elinor, who can be just as terse as she can be garrulous, says, "'Quick [...] the address of the Association'" (p.507).

"The pomegranate and lemon trees, the terraced fountain, where golden carp slithered" (p.508) to say nothing of "the pagoda-like enclosure, where Japanese sand-badgers disported themselves" (p.508) have the desired effect of suppressing Gwenda's appetite for the excellent food and boasting about her own garden.  Unfortunately, only a few days later Gwenda pays an unscheduled visit and Elinor's yard is in its usual state.  That is when "'having an emergency brain'" (p.508) comes to her rescue and she invents a suffragette raid which she claims has ruined her garden, assuring Gwenda with superb aplomb, "'I shall have it laid out again on rather more elaborate lines'" (p.508).

There is a surprise in store for the masterful Adela Chemping in "The Dreamer" also.  As an illuminating description of the vagaries of the female shopper and an expansion on the theme of "The Sex That Doesn't Shop", "The Dreamer" provides many telling insights which still hold true today.  But there is more to the story than that in the person of Cyprian,⁸⁶ another in the Reginald, Clovis, Bertie mould.  Enlisted by his aunt as a parcel carrier in her bargain-hunting expedition during the annual sales, he turns up hatless, giving his aunt a moment of disquiet.  "'You are not going to be what they call a Nut, are you?'" (p.323) she enquires anxiously, concerned in case this means that carrying her parcels will not suit his image.  In having "the wondering look of a dreamer, the eyes of one who sees things that are not visible to ordinary mortals" (p.323) he is nevertheless the very reverse of otherworldly, a very shrewd judge of character who looks at his aunt "with his wondering, dreamy eyes" (p.323)⁸⁷ and gives her an answer, tailor-made to reassure her as to his good manners and reliability: "'I didn't bring a hat [...] because it is such a nuisance when one is shopping; I mean it is so awkward if one meets any one one knows and has to take one's hat off when one's hands are full of parcels'" (p.323).

This does much to mollify Mrs Chemping in her distaste for the unconventional but she is not gracious in her acknowledgement of it.  As he follows in her wake, "the wondering look deepened in Cyprian's eyes" (p.324), clearly now a look of disbelief at what his aunt appears to regard as a rewarding pastime, looking at, with no intention of buying, napkins.  She veers abruptly from one department to another, her thought processes as inconsecutive as her movements.  Having announced that she needs a salad bowl she ends up with seven flower vases of a type that are outmoded but which she informs Cyprian "'will do for presents next Christmas'" (p.324).  (It is January).⁸⁸

For a friend who is going abroad she buys "stacks of writing paper; it was so cheap and it went so flat in a trunk or portmanteau.  She also bought a few envelopes - envelopes somehow seemed rather an extravagance compared with notepaper" (p.324), her mean streak predominating.  Cyprian is consulted as to the colour, chooses grey at random, whereupon Adela asks the assistant if she has mauve, and on the production of green and darker grey, chooses blue.

There is a pause for inadequate refreshment and Cyprian leaves the parcels with the cloak-room attendant, again to Mrs Chemping's temporary disappointment, since "some of the pleasure and excitement of a shopping expedition seemed to evaporate when one was deprived of immediate personal contact with one's purchases" (p.325).  She is one of those who likes to gloat over her acquisitions.

When "the dreaming look in the boy's eyes changed for a moment into one of mute protest" (p.325), Adela tells him to meet her later in the cutlery department.  He is not there at the appointed time, however, and she finds him eventually in the leather goods department, the victim of what appears to be "a pardonable but rather embarrassing mistake" (p.325).  Adela has the satisfaction of saying to herself, "'There now [...] she takes him for one of the shop assistants because he hasn't got a hat on.  I wonder it hasn't happened before'" (p.325).  Saki says simply, "Perhaps it had" (p.325), and goes on to describe Cyprian's trick of selling the bag to the lady and pocketing the proceeds.

His aunt's eyes are opened to the truth at last and "several kind strangers helped Adela into the open air" (p.326).  The next time she sees him "the dream look" (p.326), clearly a dream of avarice, "was deeper than ever in his eyes.  He had just sold two books of devotion to an elderly Canon" (p.326).

Throughout this story Cyprian's eyes are described as wondering and dreamy, not only "the eyes of one who sees things that are not visible to ordinary mortals" (p.323), but also "invest the commonplace things of this world with qualities unsuspected by plainer folk - the eyes of a poet or a house agent" (p.323),⁸⁹ as Saki cynically observes.  The clues have been there for someone more perceptive than his aunt to read and the remark about the hat's being "a nuisance when one is shopping" (p.323) gives rise to the suspicion that Cyprian has done this sort of thing before.

The theme of shopping is used to highlight another defect of character in "Fur".  The crucial difference between Suzanne and her friend Eleanor is that the latter is prepared to help Suzanne in her scheming to acquire an expensive birthday present from her rich cousin, Bertram Kneyght, whereas Suzanne is not willing to sacrifice an evening of her time so that Eleanor can meet her friend Harry Scarisbrooke.  In fact it is Eleanor who, having accepted without censure Suzanne's assertion, "'I don't want to be greedy, of course, but I don't like being wasteful,'" (p.377), devises the plan to meet Bertram and sidetrack him into the emporium where Suzanne has seen the coveted silver-fox stole.

Eleanor, in common with Clovis, Vera, Cyprian and the rest, is clearly a formidable ally and an equally formidable foe.  She has what Suzanne lacks: an ability to see beyond herself, which is in itself a form of self-preservation, a kind of enlightened self-interest.  Had Suzanne taken note of her friend's reaction to her glib refusal to return a favour, heeding the "angry glint coming into her eyes" (p.379), she might have been warned.  But to her "the sacrifices of friendship were beautiful in her eyes as long as she was not asked to make them" (p.379).

This fatal self-absorption marks the turning point of the story.  All appears to be proceeding according to plan, Suzanne forging ahead, while Bertram Kneyght is shepherded towards the fur department by Eleanor.  Then Eleanor claims, "'My birthday comes the day before [Suzanne's]'" (p.380), which is the first sign of duplicity.  Next she relates a pitiful tale about an elusive silver-fox stole which she had been promised but never received, and recommends that Bertram buy Suzanne a fan, the very thing she wants least.

It is only some days later that the truth emerges.  Suzanne phones Eleanor to thank her in a most perfunctory manner for what is admittedly a maliciously uninspired gift of a photograph frame, and - the real purpose of the call - to complain about Bertram's present to her.  Eleanor's revenge is complete when, after some equally perfunctory remark, she tells her friend that she is the triumphant possessor of the coveted fur.  The scales at last and too late fall from Suzanne's eyes.  As Saki succinctly summarises in the last sentence, "A cloud has arisen between the friendships of the two young women; as far as Eleanor is concerned the cloud has a silver-fox lining" (p.381).⁹⁰

As in so many of the stories, warnings are ignored and arrogance is punished.  Eleanor demonstrates the kind of quick thinking which together with longer term planning seems to characterise Saki's successful jokers and his children.  This fertility of imagination and ability to carry plans through is always combined with a self-awareness and an instinctive knowledge of the weaknesses of others.  Eleanor succeeds because she is inventive, thorough, ruthless when required and opportunistic, qualities which she shares with Vera, Clovis and the rest of Saki's practical jokers.  The victims on the other hand have much in common with the obtuse adults like the aunt in "The Lumber-Room" or Mrs De Ropp in "Sredni Vashtar", or the wilfully blind in the supernatural stories, in being egocentric and gullible.

Throughout the lies and practical jokes there runs a thread of rough justice, the victim not only deserving his punishment but in many cases almost weaving his own fate.  In the "Talking-Out" stories, as in "Adventurer Purse-Sappers", the bore or cadger is talked to a standstill.  In the case of the practical jokes it is by exploitation of the weakness or vice that the victim is routed.  In every instance a deciding factor in favour of the liar or joker is his ability to exceed the worst excesses of his victim.

Notes

1. "The Tales of Saki", p.234.
2. To be discussed at greater length in "Elaborate Futilities".
3. An unsigned review of Beasts and Superbeasts, Spectator, 113 (July 11, 1914), 61.
4. Like the children in "The Penance" whose "range of sight did not seem to concern itself with Octavian's presence" (p.424), and Tobermory who "fixed his gaze serenely on the middle distance" (p.111).
5. Compare this with the description of Stephen Thorle in The Unbearable Bassington : "He had the loud penetrating voice and the prominent penetrating eyes of a man who can do no listening in the ordinary way and whose eyes have to perform the function of listening for him" (p.663).
6. Nicknamed "The Orchid Boy" (1894 - 1975), the French Lightweight Boxing Champion at the age of sixteen, and European Champion at Welterweight in 1911, he went on to be champion at four weights, becoming World Heavyweight Champion in 1913.
7. Caiaphas is, of course, the name of the High Priest at Christ's trial.
8. To be discussed in "Elaborate Futilities".
9. A "so-called Cullumpton ghost" features in "The Hedgehog", p.476.
10. This telltale sign is present in "The Square Egg" too: "he had the contemplative downward droop of nose and moustache and the furtive sidelong range of eye - all those things that are the ordinary outfit of the purse-sapper the world over" (p.542).
11. Like Amblecope in "A Defensive Diamond": "There was silence for nearly half a minute" (p.356).
12. Curiously reminiscent of Treddleford's tales in "A "Defensive Diamond" in which blotting-paper and camels feature separately.  Perhaps this is another instance of the "dangerous or improper uses" of blotting-paper referred to in "The Sex That Doesn't Shop" (p.56).
13. The Importance of Being Earnest: "To lose one parent, Mr Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness" in Oscar Wilde, Plays, Prose Writings and Poems (London: Dent, 1961), p.360.
14. L.pp.310-15.
15. This perception of the passage of time is evoked in "Sredni Vashtar" also: "the minutes were slipping by.  They were long minutes, but they slipped by nevertheless" (p.139); in "The Penance": "a watch, into which the soul of a dead plumber seemed to have passed" (p.427); and in "Cross Currents": "the ill-assorted trio watched the insufferable hours crawl slowly by" (p.89); whereas in "The Mouse": "the minutes throbbed by" (p.97) where Voler's is an experience of accelerated time in his wish to delay the moment of truth.
16. This recalls the ending of "The Interlopers".
17. There are also interesting parallels to be drawn with "The Wolves of Cernogratz" in which a feeling of scandalous outrage is the chief reaction to Amalie's supernatural claims and one of relief when the seemingly miraculous can be accounted for by some more mundane explanation.  "'It was an impertinence,' snapped out the Baron, his protruding eyes taking on a scandalized expression" (p.411), and "The Baroness eagerly agreed that the cold was responsible for these things" (p.414).
18. Loganbill's description of him, p.106.
19. Recalling "a spirit of wistful emulation took possession of the author" (p.472) in "Mark".
20. Gortsby in "Dusk" as well as having a similar name has similar characteristics to Gorworth.
21. This eponymous verb has a parallel in "'Ministers of Grace'": "to koepenick" (p.215), see footnote 55, "The Domain of Miracle".
22. In the original version of "Esmé", published in Westminster Gazette, December 17, 1910, p.3, the Baroness is recounting the tale to the "Irrelevant Man", the introduction of Clovis obviously a later change to suit the collection: "The Chronicles of Clovis".
23. In "The Almanack" (L.pp.293-98), a practical joke in which Clovis and Vera Durmot are partners, the hunting part of the story includes precisely these ingredients.
24. "'My final capture by the winning pair was not a very dramatic episode, in fact, I'm not sure that they would have taken any notice of me if I hadn't spoken to them and patted them'" (p.52).
25. The mention of Crowley in conjunction with the word "beast" two lines later is almost certainly intended to suggest 'Aleister' Crowley (1875-1947), a Satanist who claimed to be the Beast from the Book of Revelation.  An article by Aleister Crowley, entitled "Concerning 'Blasphemy' in General and the 'Rites of Eleusis' in Particular" appeared in Bystander, November 16, 1910, p.321 (with an editorial disclaimer).
26. The ironic observation that "'I doubt if he's ravening at the present moment'" (p.104) has an echo in "The Recessional": "wolves are always ravening from mere force of habit, even after they've hopelessly overeaten themselves" (p.202), and in "The Guests": "'Not in the least ravening [...] it was full of goat'" (p.421).
27. Referred to by Fogle (p.90) as "Anabel" and "Annabel" (twice).  The fact that Saki has drawn attention to the name in saying, "Her name was Amabel; it was the vicar's one extravagance.  Amabel was accounted a beauty" (p.17), makes this kind of error the more surprising and may be another indication of the sort of cursory study to which Saki has so often been subjected.
28. An incident which calls to mind Groby's treatment of the stable-boy in "The Remoulding of Groby Lington", p.228.
29. Christmas appears to have the same effect on Bertie Steffink in "Bertie's Christmas Eve" (pp.436-41) and with similar consequences to Bertie.
30. The flavour of this story seems to derive from a couple of incidents in Saki's own life, notably during a stay in Dresden and again in Davos, described by his sister in her "Biography", pp.26-34.
31. Perhaps the same Princess as referred to in "The Talking-Out of Tarrington", p.190.
32. There are obvious parallels to be drawn with the plots of "The Penance" and "Hyacinth" where pigs are also used by children for ransom purposes.
33. Elizabeth Drew, Atlantic Monthly, p.97, says that in Hilaire Belloc's poem, "Matilda came to a bad end, but Saki's child and adult liars never come to a bad end".
34. Although a Mrs Cuvering appears in "Fate", p.484.
35. In "The Open Window", "The Lull", "A Touch of Realism", "The Quince Tree", and "The Almanack".
36. Like that in "The Lumber-Room".
37. All Saki's children seem to be well versed in the Bible.  To the compulsory "three rs" in the primary education of the day a fourth might be added: religion.
38. In "The Penance" they are perched on a wall and in "The Lumber-Room" the aunt is trapped in a tank, for example.
39. "Saki and Wodehouse", p.90.
40. "Only once had she put the doctrine of non-interference into practice, when one of its most eloquent exponents had been besieged for nearly three hours in a small and extremely uncomfortable may-tree by an angry boar-pig" (p.283), a variation on the theme of "The Boar-Pig".
41. A symptom as disquieting to the initiated as "the dangerous enthusiasm of a convert" (p.17) displayed by Reginald in "Reginald's Choir Treat".
42. As in "The Jesting of Arlington Stringham", pp.133 and 136, and in "The Hedgehog", p.476.
43. Compare this to the sentiments expressed in "Hyacinth": "'Children with Hyacinth's temperament don't know better as they grow older; they merely know more'" (p.519).
44. Saki's first love, of history, shows itself in this reference to the peasant uprising in France in 1357-58.
45. A meal as uncomfortable as at the end of "The Lumber-Room" when "tea that evening was partaken of in a fearsome silence" (p.376).
46. This incident is repeated in A Watched Pot:
    "... 'but a hen came in between them'.
    Hortensia: A hen?'" (p.887).
    It is a hen that starts the trouble between the Cricks and the Saunderses in "The Blood-Feud of Toad-Water" too (pp.56-59).
47. "Partial Expression" will be discussed in "Elaborate Futilities".
48. In this case Damocles.  Vagueness like this, as in "Mark": "the Reverend What's-his-name" (p.470), or in "The Quince Tree": "the Louvre picture, La Something or other" (p.327), for instance, is a frequent target for Saki's barbs, ironically called "lack of specialization" (p.49) in "The Lost Sanjak".
49. The word "migration" in conjunction with the name, Martlet (a house-martin), helps to compound the absurdity of the feud concerning a hen.  As Katrakis says in her dissertation, Jane is "the type who 'roosts' wherever she goes" (p.82).
50. Spectator, 197 (Dec.21, 1956), 907.
51. Like Clovis in "The Stampeding of Lady Bastable", p.119.
52. Equivalent to the "strenuous, unseeing gaze" (p.280) which is an invitation to comment in "The Romancers".
53. A characteristic shared by Van Cheele and others.
54. In "For The Duration of the War" it is "elderly colonels, who had outlived the love of truth" (p.536).
55. The same Lord Pabham who features in "Esmé" and perhaps intended to indicate Lord Pelham, one of the Victorian 'Beef Barons'.
56. Mortimer in "The Music on the Hill" gives a serious warning along the same lines: "'if you're wise you won't disbelieve in him [Pan] too boastfully'" (p.162).
57. Clovis is ironic here.  In "Dusk" Gortsby is apologetic in saying, "'You must excuse my disbelief, but appearances were really rather against you'" (p.301).
58. In "The Boar-Pig" Matilda uses over ripe medlars to lure the pig.
59. This same subtle technique to underline a joke is used in "Reginald at the Carlton": "'taught to speak - oh, dozens of languages! - and then he became a Trappist monk'" (p.25).
60. "Saki: Practical Jokes...", p.124.
61. Described thus in Spectator, July 11, 1914, p.61.
62. 'The Satiric Art of H.H. Munro (Saki)', pp.29-35.
63. 'Development of Method and Meaning...', p.112.
64. The irony of the name "Vera", meaning true, is that while she may be an accomplished liar, she exposes the truth about her victims.
65. Just like the distracted Sophie in "The Byzantine Omelette" or the bearded stranger in "Quail Seed", p.432.
66. 'The Satiric Art...', p.30.
67. Just as in "Gabriel-Ernest", Van Cheele's aunt says, "'One would think you had seen a wolf'" (p.66).
68. In his "Introduction", The Best of Saki (London: Picador, 1976), p.7.
69. Spectator, 197, p.907.
70. In "The Almanack" too, Vera can predict what sermon the vicar will preach at New Year, because "'at his time of life men dislike change'" (L.p.294).
71. He uses his shirt cuff as an emergency note pad in "A Matter of Sentiment" too, p.206.
72. Both Vera (in "The Lull") and Clovis betray an amused interest in Boy Scouts and a disregard for the finer feelings of maids.
73. "It was not her day for having a headache" (p.130).
74. This exchange has much the flavour of Nicholas in "The Lumber-Room" talking to his aunt in the gooseberry garden.
75. This kind of inverted protection is like Clovis's suggestion of putting barbed wire round the yew tree in "The Secret Sin of Septimus Brope" (p.210).
76. Bearing out Reginald's assertion in "Reginald on Tariffs": "There are only two classes that really can't help taking life seriously - schoolgirls of thirteen and Hohenzollerns" (p.30).
77. Frederick L. Beaty, "Mrs Packletide and Tartarin", Nineteenth-Century Fiction: Notes and Queries, (December 1952), 219-20, draws attention to the inspiration behind this tale.
78. For instance, "The Recessional", in which she is again engaged in upstaging Loona Bimberton.  Her appeal for Clovis is as "a sort of financial ambulance" (p.200).
79. Just as Octavian pleads with the children, "'You surely wouldn't treat my poor little Olivia in that way?'" (p.426).
80. Apart from its literal meaning, "Les Fauves" is a reference to the first of the great aesthetic movements in twentieth century painting, reaching its peak in 1905-06.
81. V.S. Pritchett, p.18.
82. Lena is even "'quite indignant with me if I interfere on behalf of an ill-treated, over-driven animal on the road'" (p.415), says Strudwarden, showing that he shares the same values as Lady Carlotta (p.283).
83. "The premier taxidermist of late Victorian London" according to Ritvo, The Animal Estate, p.274.
84. "Except when he was the bidden guest of some one with an irreproachable income, Laploshka was wont to curb his appetite for high living; on such fortunate occasions he let it go on an easy snaffle" (p.73) and "towards the poor [...] his attitude was one of watchful anxiety" (p.72).
85. Almost certainly the same Baroness as the romancer of "Esmé", and the willing audience in "The Story of St Vespaluus".
86. An ingenious and daring choice of name with its connotations of depravity.
87. He much resembles Reginald who has "the dreamy, far-away look that a volcano might wear" (p.7), "Reginald".
88. Presents such as this justify Reginald's sentiments in "Reginald on Christmas Presents", pp.8-10.
89. The imaginative propensities of house agents feature in "Excepting Mrs Pentherby" too: "It might easily languish in the estate market for years, set round with notice-boards proclaiming it, in the eyes of a sceptical world, to be an eminently desirable residence" (p.466).
90. Just as the loss of Constance Broddle's friendship is more than compensated for by the proceeds from the brooch in "Esmé".

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