When you're going to do a thing, there's nothing like making a quick
start. I wrote to Harold straight away, proposing myself for a visit.
And Harold wrote back telling me to come right along.

Harold and Hilda lived alone in a large house. I believe they did a
good deal of entertaining at times, but on this occasion I was the only
guest. The only other person of note in the place was Ponsonby, the
butler.

Of course, if Harold had been an ordinary sort of chappie, what I had
come to do would have been a pretty big order. I don't mind many
things, but I do hesitate to dig into my host's intimate private
affairs. But Harold was such a simple-minded Johnnie, so grateful for a
little sympathy and advice, that my job wasn't so very difficult.

It wasn't as if he minded talking about Amelia, which was his first
wife's name. The difficulty was to get him to talk of anything else. I
began to understand what Ann meant by saying it was tough on Hilda.

I'm bound to say the old boy was clay in my hands. People call me a
chump, but Harold was a super-chump, and I did what I liked with him.
The second morning of my visit, after breakfast, he grabbed me by the
arm.

"This way, Reggie. I'm just going to show old Reggie Amelia's portrait,
dear."

There was a little room all by itself on the top floor. He explained to
me that it had been his studio. At one time Harold used to do a bit of