However, a day or two later Fate played into our hands. Miss Ropes
herself inadvertently left the cage door open, and Philip escaped. The
entire establishment devoted the day to his pursuit, without success;
but in the evening the truant, dissipated and distended, lurched into
his cage of his own accord and went instantly to sleep.

Encouraged by his return and by the regular habits of my hypothetical
bullfinch, Miss Ropes let him out again next day. This time he did not
come back.

"Probably he's sleeping it off somewhere," said Haynes cheerfully.
"He'll be back to-morrow."

However he wasn't. Miss Ropes had his description posted up in
the village, and next day a telephone message informed us that a
suspicious red-headed character answering to the specification was
loitering near the "Waggon and Horses," and was being kept under
observation. Miss Ropes and Haynes went off to arrest him, but hardly
had they disappeared down the drive when Philip in person appeared on
the lawn.

This gave our handy man, James, his chance. James simply loves to make
himself useful. If anybody wants anything done he can always rely on
James to do it by a more complicated method and with more trouble
to himself than the ordinary man could conceive. His education is
generally understood to have consisted of an exhaustive study of the
"How-To-Make" column in the _Boys' Own Paper_, completed by a short
course of domestic engineering under Mr. W. HEATH ROBINSON.