Dialstone Lane, Part 1 by W.W. Jacobs

In less than a week Captain Bowers had settled down comfortably in his / new command. A set of rules and regulations by which Mr. Joseph Tasker / was to order his life was framed and hung in the pantry. He studied it / with care, and, anxious that there should be no possible chance of a / misunderstanding, questioned the spelling in three instances. The / captain's explanation that he had spelt those words in the American style / was an untruthful reflection upon a great and friendly nation.

Dialstone Lane was at first disposed to look askance at Mr. Tasker. / Old-fashioned matrons clustered round to watch him cleaning the doorstep, / and, surprised at its whiteness, withdrew discomfited. Rumour had it / that he liked work, and scandal said that he had wept because he was not / allowed to do the washing.

The captain attributed this satisfactory condition of affairs to the / rules and regulations, though a slight indiscretion on the part of Mr. / Tasker, necessitating the unframing of the document to add to the latter, / caused him a little annoyance.

The first intimation he had of it was a loud knocking at the front door / as he sat dozing one afternoon in his easy-chair. In response to his / startled cry of "Come in! " the door opened and a small man, in a state / of considerable agitation, burst into the room and confronted him.

"My name is Chalk," he said, breathlessly.

"A friend of Mr. Tredgold's? " said the captain. "I've heard of you, / sir."

The visitor paid no heed.

"My wife wishes to know whether she has got to dress in the dark every / afternoon for the rest of her life," he said, in fierce but trembling / tones.

"Got to dress in the dark? " repeated the astonished captain.

"With the blind down," explained the other.

Captain Bowers looked him up and down. He saw a man of about fifty / nervously fingering the little bits of fluffy red whisker which grew at / the sides of his face, and trying to still the agitation of his tremulous / mouth.

"How would you like it yourself? " demanded the visitor, whose manner was / gradually becoming milder and milder. "How would you like a telescope a / yard long pointing -- "

He broke off abruptly as the captain, with a smothered oath, dashed out / of his chair into the garden and stood shaking his fist at the / crow's-nest at the bottom.

"Joseph! " he bawled.

"Yes, sir," said Mr. Tasker, removing the telescope described by Mr. / Chalk from his eye, and leaning over.

"What are you doing with that spy-glass? " demanded his master, beckoning / to the visitor, who had drawn near. "How dare you stare in at people's / windows?"

"I wasn't, sir," replied Mr. Tasker, in an injured voice. "I wouldn't / think o' such a thing -- I couldn't, not if I tried."

"You'd got it pointed straight at my bedroom window," cried Mr. Chalk, as / he accompanied the captain down the garden. "And it ain't the first / time."

"I wasn't, sir," said the steward, addressing his master. "I was / watching the martins under the eaves."

"You'd got it pointed at my window," persisted the visitor.