I took hold of myself. There is no such thing as universal insurance. Black hole there might be, but the first thing a bitterly sobering man would do would be to probe it, find a light to shine here and there until the hole was seen to be no more than a case of forgetfulness that must increase with the advance, year by year, of middle age. My sanity told me that there was a tool to hand. I had only to go downstairs, examine the four empty bottles and the fifth partly empty one, look round in the spirit of Holmes or of Maigret and reconstruct that period between dinner and bed from the evidence of glasses and bottles, spilt booze it might be, or perhaps mercifully not and I should find the fifth bottle still full with no more than a cork drawn—

At that, I heard Elizabeth turn over in the other bed with a sleeper’s sigh. She would know—oh, yes indeed! Doubtless I should hear all in bad time; but why wake her and ask? The way to discover the truth was to creep down in dressing-gown and slippers, yes, and with the pocket torch which I kept at the ready by my bed because our area is notorious for power failures. Nor must I be fobbed off by any drunken efforts on my own part to conceal the evidence. I must interrogate the bottles. If it proved necessary, I must sneak out of the back door—no, the conservatory was quieter—get to the dustbin, ashcan, poubelle, whatever one chose to call it and, not to elaborate, count the empties. For the truth was that already I did not believe in the bottle still full but with the cork drawn. That would be a miracle and miracles, though they might happen, did not seem to apply to me. Yet, so enfeebled was I in mind rather than body that the thought of waking Elizabeth accidentally turned the prospect of getting out of bed into a test of will power like diving into cold water. I have never liked cold water.

It was at this moment that my wavering mind was made up for me. The rubberized lid of the dustbin outside the back door fell off. Somehow that made the whole issue clear. I was no longer a repentant drinker. I was Outraged Householder. Sir, how much longer in the guise of enlightened conservationism are we to endure the depredations of these clumsy creatures and at the same time run the risk of contamination by a disease once thought eradicated? Sir, while we must be mindful, sir—sir, sir, sir—

Bloody badgers. I twisted out of bed, hardly minding whether Elizabeth woke or not. The only gun in my house was an ancient but powerful airgun which I had acquired with a tin of pellets through circumstances too trivial and complex to be worth recording. Author—no, well-known author—no, damn it, Wilfred Barclay shoots badger. Was there a law against it? Something dating from King John or thereabouts? Could you not shoot a badger on your own land? My head was quite extraordinarily uncluttered, my hangover marvellously pushed into the background. I felt pardoned. Perhaps it was the possibility of killing something, the countryman’s hereditary privilege. I bundled into my dressng-gown, shoved on my slippers. Stealthily I stole down the stairs, past the room where our guest slept his solitary sleep in the letto matrimoniale of the spare room. I fished the gun out of the cupboard by the dining-room fireplace, cocked and loaded it. I tiptoed into the warm conservatory, opened the door and peered round the corner.