Danny, the Champion of the World

On his way to greet his arriving guests, Mr. Hazell drives past William’s filling station, which is covered with his pheasants. Furious, Mr. Hazell gets out of his car and charges toward William, shouting obscenities and demanding that William return the pheasants to him. William calmly points out that the pheasants belong to the person who owns the land that they are on, and in this case they are on William’s land. Sergeant Samways joins the crowd, arriving on his bicycle. Mr. Hazell explains that William has somehow “enticed [the pheasants] out of my woods onto his filthy little filling station” (183). Sergeant Samways, who was looking forward to some of William’s pheasants, questions Mr. Hazell about how it is possible to entice pheasants. This frustrates an already steaming Mr. Hazell, who makes the mistake of poking Sergeant Samways in the chest and demanding that he’d “better do something about it fast […] unless you want to lose those sergeant stripes of yours!” (184). Mr. Hazell angrily admits that he doesn’t have evidence that William “enticed” his pheasants.

William steps in and calmly explains that the pheasants “knew they were going to be shot today if they stayed in your wood, so they flew in here to wait until the shooting was over” (185).