Dear friends,

Please come in, seat yourself near the fireplace, and join me for a cup of good tea, hot and sweet! There can be no better refreshment for visitors who have just come through an ordeal upon the relentlessly stormy seas of the Cyberlag Archipelago!

Mrs. Grogan will see to your wraps as the cloakroom is off limits to visitors at present, owing to my dear sister Athena's latest renovation scheme. Why the size of such a utilitarian room must be expanded half again is beyond me, especially as it will then encroach upon the indoor kennel where my hounds (whom you encountered upon your arrival, by the look of things) abide during cyclonic storms.

I suppose my dear sister has not spared a thought for those 14 loyal canine companions who are, in a shifting world, more deserving of shelter than most.

I can't think why a few dog-hairs on one's wraps are so upsetting to Athena's crowd, who are the vanguard of Engineering Abnormalities Research worldwide, and who think nothing of bringing robots or experimental chickens with them to tea.

But there you are. In matters of household management, as in matters of science, my dear sister is not to be contradicted.

One might wish her household improvement programmes extended to her son, my worthless nephew Hardy "Bingo" Flutterblast, who richly deserves to be hung on hooks, as Gazette readers well know.

He has treated our houseguest Cecil "Nobby" Robinson most discourteously, pulling the chair out from under him as we were being seated at tea, and then later continuously blowing cigarette smoke at him and flicking ashes and biscuit crumbs in his direction from across the table.

Mrs. Grogan told me that yesterday she came upon Bingo just as he was plunging a lit cigarette into a jar of Nobby's hair pomade, setting it ablaze! Readers, I confess that perhaps I should not have quipped that it was good riddance to such a foppish ointment, which has no place in the dressing room of any gentleman, but of course I should have been more sympathetic to Mrs. Grogan's worries regarding Bingo's mischievous pranks.

She replied most vehemently that my nephew's manners had descended to such a level of rudeness as to shock and outrage even the most degenerate pirates in Gallus Meg's Tavern, a statement which was, in my experience, somewhat in excess of the facts.

My dear sister Athena believes her son's childish behaviour is attributable to the influence of Mrs. Grogan's niece, who is lodging with us for the nonce, but I cannot quite see the connexion, unless it is a contest between Bingo and Nobby for the attentions of that nice if somewhat vacuous champion of Plants Rights, the which rivalry I would view with great concern.

A vain and a worthless idler he may be, but I never considered that our Bingo might be within range of pitiless Cupid's arrows, as I once was at his tender age, to my sad cost! I dread to think it's my young self, my beloved Charlotte, and the beastly Geographic Society photographer all over again!

The whole thing will bear watching, I suppose, and from now on I shall take particular pains to keep an eye on young Nobby until his guardian and uncle, my dear friend Benny Robinson, arrives on our shores.

Everyone at Swinehurst will be along to join us for tea presently, and thereafter I would be very grateful to you if all subjects touching upon Plants and Wreckmaster Security and hair pomade were carefully avoided in conversation.

All Best,

Rohde

TO THE GAZETTE