‘Inspector Umpelty?’
‘Yes, miss. You will be Miss Kohn, I take it? This is Lord Peter Wimsey, who has been kind enough to run me up to Town.!
‘Very pleased to meet you,’ said Miss Kohn, ‘Come in.’ She ushered them into a pleasantly, furnished room, with orange window-curtains and bowls of roses placed here and there on low tables and a general air of semi-artistic refinement. Before the empty fireplace stood a dark-haired young man of Semitic appearance, who acknowledged the introductions with a scowl.
‘Mr Simons, my fiance,’ explained Miss Kohn. Do sit down, and please smoke: Can I offer you any refreshment’
Declining the refreshment, and heartily wishing Mr Simons out of the way, the Inspector embarked at once on the subject of the photograph, but it, soon became obvious both to Wimsey and himself that Miss Kohn, had told in her letter nothing more or less than the exact truth. Sincerity was stamped on every feature of her face as she assured them repeatedly that she had never known Paul Alexis and never, given him; a photograph under the name of Feodora or any other name. They showed her his photograph, but she shook her head.
‘I am perfectly positive, that I never saw him in my life,’
Wimsey suggested that he might have seen her at a mannequin parade and endeavoured to introduce himself.
‘Of course, he may have seen me; so many people see me,’ replied Miss Kohn, with artless self-importance. ‘Some of them try to get off with one too, naturally. A girl in my, position has to know how to look after herself. But I think I should remember this face if I had ever seen it. You see, a young man with a beard like that is rather noticeable, isn’t he?’
She passed the photograph to Mr Simons, who bent his dark eyes on it disdainfully. Then his expression changed.
‘You know, Olga,’’ he said, ‘I think I have seen this man somewhere.’
‘You, Lewis?’
‘Yes. I don’t know where. But there is something familiar about it.’
‘You never saw him with me,’ put in the girl, quickly.
‘No. I don’t know, now I come to think of, it, that I ever saw him at all. It’s an older face, the one I’m thinking of — it may be a picture I have seen and not a living person. I don’t know.’
The photograph has been published in the papers,’ suggested Umpelty.
‘I know; but it isn’t that. I noticed a resemblance to somebody or other, the first time I saw it. I don’t know what it is. Something about the eyes, perhaps—’
He paused thoughtfully and the Inspector gazed at him as though he expected him to lay a golden egg there and then, but nothing came of it.
‘No, I can’t place it,’ said Simons, finally. He handed the photograph back.
‘Well, it means nothing to me,’ said Olga Kohn. ‘I do hope you all believe that’
‘I believe you,’ said Wimsey, suddenly, ‘and I’m going to hazard a, suggestion. This Alexis fellow was a romantic sort of blighter. Do you think he can have, seen the photograph somewhere and fallen in love with it, as you might say? What I mean is, he might have indulged in an imaginary thingmabob — an ideal passion, so to speak. Kind of fancied he was beloved and all the rest of it, and put a fancy name on to support the illusion if you get what I mean what?’
‘It is possible,’ said Olga, ‘but it seems very foolish.’
‘Seems perfectly cock-eyed to me,’ pronounced Umpelty with scorn. ‘Besides, where did he get the picture from, that’s what we want to know.’
‘That wouldn’t really be difficult,’ said Olga. ‘He was a dancer at a big hotel. He might easily have met many theatrical managers, and one of them might have given the photograph to him. They would get it, you know, from the agents’
Inspector Umpelty asked for particulars of the agents and was supplied with the names of three men, all of whom had offices near Shaftesbury Avenue.,
‘But I don’t suppose they’ll remember much about it,’ said Olga. ‘They see so many people. Still, you could try. I should be terribly glad. to have the thing cleared up. But you do believe me, don’t you?’
‘We believe in, you, Miss Kohn,’ said Wimsey, solemnly, ’as devoutly as in the second law of thermodynamics.’
‘What are you getting at?’ said Mr Simons, suspiciously.
‘The second law of thermo-dynamics,’ explained Wimsey, helpfully, ‘which holds the universe in its path, and without which time would run backwards like a cinema film wound the wrong way.’
‘No, would it?’ exclaimed Miss Kohn, rather pleased. ‘Altars may reel,’ said Wimsey, ‘Mr Thomas may abandon his dress-suit and Mr Snowden renounce Free Trade, but the second law of thermo-dynamics will endure while memory holds her seat in this distracted globe, by which Hamlet meant his head but which I, with a wider intellectual range, apply to the planet which we have the rapture of inhabiting. Inspector Umpelty appears shocked, but I assure you that I know no more impressive way of affirming my entire belief in your absolute integrity.’ He grinned. ‘What I like about your evidence, Miss Kohn, is that. it adds the final touch of utter and impenetrable obscurity to the problem which the Inspector and I have undertaken to solve. It reduces it to the complete quintessence of incomprehensive nonsense. Therefore, by the second law of thermodynamics, which lays down that we are hourly and momently progressing to a state of more and more randomness, we receive positive assurance that we are moving happily and securely in the right direction. You may not believe me,’ added Wimsey, now merrily launched on a flight of fantasy, ‘but I have got to the point now at which the slightest glimmer of common-sense imported into this preposterous case would not merely disconcert me but cut me to the heart. I have seen unpleasant cases, difficult cases, complicated cases and even contradictory cases, but a case founded on stark unreason I have never met before. It is a new experience and, blase as I am, I confess that I am thrilled to the marrow.’
‘Well,’ said Inspector Umpelty, hoisting himself to his feet,’
‘I’m sure we’re very much obliged to you, miss, for your information, though at the moment it doesn’t seem, to get us much farther. If anything should occur to you in connection with this Alexis, or if you sir, should happen to call to mind where you saw Alexis before, we shall be very greatly obliged. And you mustn’t take account of what his lordship here has been saying,’ because he’s a gentleman that makes up poetry and talks a bit humorous at times.’
Having thus, as he supposed, restored confidence in the mind of Miss Olga Kohn, the Inspector; shepherded his companion away, but it was to Wimsey that the girl turned while Umpelty was hunting in the little hall for his hat.
‘That policeman doesn’t believe a word I’ve been saying,’ she whispered anxiously, ‘but you do, don’t you?’
‘I do,’ replied;Wimsey. ‘But you see, I can believe a thing without understanding it. It’s all a matter, of training.’
Chapter XXIII. The Evidence Of The Theatrical Agent