Quotation from: Love Among the Chickens

Written by: P.G. Wodehouse


Or again. There was a bicycle and photograph shop near the school. He
blew into this one day and his roving eye fell on a tandem bicycle. He
did not want a tandem bicycle, but that influenced him not at all. He
ordered it, provisionally. He also ordered an enlarging camera, a
Kodak, and a magic lantern. The order was booked and the goods were to
be delivered when he had made up his mind concerning them. After a
week the shopman sent round to ask if there were any further
particulars which Mr. Ukridge would like to learn before definitely
ordering them. Mr. Ukridge sent word back that he was considering the
matter, and that in the meantime would he be so good as to let him
have that little clockwork man in his window, which walked when wound
up? Having got this, and not paid for it, Ukridge thought that he had
done handsomely by the bicycle and photograph man, and that things
were square between them. The latter met him a few days afterwards and
expostulated plaintively. Ukridge explained. "My good man," he said,
"you know, I really think we need say no more about the matter.
Really, you've come out of it very well. Now, look here, which would
you rather be owed for? A clockwork man, which is broken, and you can
have it back, or a tandem bicycle, an enlarging camera, a Kodak, and
a magic lantern? What?" His reasoning was too subtle for the
uneducated mind. The man retired, puzzled and unpaid, and Ukridge kept
the clockwork toy.

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