CHAPTER VIII. SIR MALLABY OFFERS A SUGGESTION
A week after the liner "Atlantic" had docked at Southampton Sam Marlowe might have been observed—and was observed by various of the residents—sitting on a bench on the esplanade of that rising watering-place, Bingley-on-the-Sea, in Sussex. All watering-places on the south coast of England are blots on the landscape, but though I am aware that by saying it I shall offend the civic pride of some of the others—none are so peculiarly foul as Bingley-on-the-Sea. The asphalte on the Bingley esplanade is several degrees more depressing than the asphalte on other esplanades. The Swiss waiters at the Hotel Magnificent, where Sam was stopping, are in a class of bungling incompetence by themselves, the envy and despair of all the other Swiss waiters at
