Folks,

C51:

There is absolutely no truth to the nasty rumor, circulating to this very day in certain circles, that I ever drank a full bottle of Dux's home-brewed whiskey, grabbed a handy very pistol and put a signal rocket through the roof of HWH Hall. In truth it was Dux who threw an unfinished bottle of Château Thames Embankment into the roaring flames of a second story bedroom. As you know, that particular label and hearty variety of wine is quite high in alcohol content. The bottle did not break, the heat touched off the alcohol and the whole lot flew from the fireplace with a whoosh and a blinding shower of sparks. A glancing blow off Olga's forehead (that would have permanently put out the lights of a full grown bull elephant) sent the thing up through the roof and out into the night. SNAFU was un-derwhelmed. Dux was Un-repentant. Olga was un-concious. I was un-der my bed.

Sperm whales, eh... LOL. She is a whale of a girl that Olga.

I never sank anything in my life at least nothing that wasn't floating about in my own bath. OK, there was that one time Dux talked me into dropping your old bowling ball off Farmer Drubbins' covered bridge just to see the splash. That's the rickety old bridge that crosses Miller's Beck. I dropped the ball and we waited....nothing, just a big, loud KERTHUNK followed by a scream, an epithet that made even Dux blush and finally sounds of much thrashing about under the bridge.

Honest, we had no idea the Vicar and his wife were fishing in a rowboat that happened to be floating just underneath that creaky old bridge.

Lucky for us all that the bowling ball passed safely between both of them as it crashed its way clean through the bottom of their little boat. I have always been sorry about that, and it was on the Sabbath too, right before August Monday. I believe that the poor Vicar not only missed the evening service but the cricket match held the next day. His wife believes to this very moment that "'twas a cannonball from hell fired by the very Dev-vil himself what sank our wee little boat."

Me sweep? I cannot use the broom, sir, for it is a left-handed broom, and I am a right-handed person. Besides which I know nothing about such machinery.