He took the pen Bredon held out, and bending over the desk addressed the envelope hurriedly to “T. Smith, Esq.” Bredon, idly watching him, was caught by his eye in the act, and apologized.
“I beg your pardon; I was snooping. Beastly habit. One catches it in the typists’ room.”
“All right-it’s only a note to a stockbroker.”
“Lucky man to have anything to stockbroke.”
Tallboy laughed, stamped the letter and tossed it to the waiting boy.
“And so ends an exhausting day,” he observed.
“Toule very tiresome?”
“Not more so than usual. He turned down ‘Like Niobe, all Tears.’ Said he didn’t know who Niobe was and he didn’t suppose anybody else did either. But he passed this week’s ‘Tears, Idle Tears,’ because when he was a boy his father used to read Tennyson aloud to the family circle.”
“That’s one saved from the wreck, anyhow.”
“Oh, yes. He liked the general idea of the poetical quotations. Said he thought they gave his advertisements class. You’ll have to think up some more. He likes the ones that illustrate well.”
“All right. ‘Like Summer Tempest came her Tears.’ That’s Tennyson, too. Picture of the nurse of ninety years setting his babe upon her knee. Babies always go well. (Sorry, we don’t seem able to get off babies.) Start the copy, Tears are often a relief to overwrought nerves, but when they flow too often, too easily, it is a sign that you need Nutrax.’ I’ll do that one. Bassanio and Antonio: ‘I know not why I am so Sad.’ Carry the quote on into the copy. ‘Causeless depression, like Antonio’s, wearies both the sufferer and his friends. Go to the root of the matter and tone up the overstrung Nerves with Nutrax.’ I can do that sort of thing by the hour.”
Mr. Tallboy smiled wanly.
“It’s a pity we can’t cure ourselves with our own nostrums, isn’t it?”
Mr. Bredon surveyed him critically.
“What you need,” he said, “is a good dinner and a bottle of fizz.”
Chapter XIV. Hopeful Conspiracy of Two Black Sheep
The gentleman in the harlequin costume removed his mask with quiet deliberation, and laid it on the table.
“Since,” he said, “my virtuous cousin Wimsey has let the cat out of the bag, I may as well take this off. I am afraid,” he turned to Dian-“my appearance will disappoint you. Except that I am handsomer and less rabbity-looking, the woman who has seen Wimsey has seen me. It is a heavy handicap to carry, but I can’t help it. The resemblance, I am happy to say, is only skin-deep.”
“It’s almost incredible,” said Major Milligan. He bent forward to examine the other’s face more closely, but Mr. Bredon extended a languid arm and, without apparently using any force at all, pushed him back into his seat.
“You needn’t come too close,” he observed, insolently. “Even a face like Wimsey’s is better than yours. Yours is spotty. You eat and drink too much.”
Major Milligan, who had, indeed, been distressed that morning by the discovery of a few small pimples on his forehead, but had hoped they were not noticeable, grunted angrily. Dian laughed.
“I take it,” pursued Mr. Bredon, “that you want to get something out of me. People of your sort always do. What is it?”
“I’ve no objection to being frank with you,” replied Major Milligan.
“How nice it is to hear anybody say that. It always prepares one for a lie to follow. Fore-warned is fore-armed, isn’t it?”
“If you choose to think so. But I think you’ll find it to your advantage to listen.”
“Financial advantage?”
“What other kind is there?”
“What indeed? I begin to like your face a trifle better.”
“Oh, do you? Perhaps you may like it well enough to answer a few questions?”
“Possibly.”
“How do you come to know Pamela Dean?”
“Pamela? A charming girl, isn’t she? I obtained an introduction to her through what the great public-seduced by the unfortunate example of that incomparable vulgarisateur, Charles Dickens-abominably calls a mutual friend. I admit that my object in obtaining the introduction was a purely business one; I can only say that I wish all business acquaintances were so agreeable.”
“What was the business?”
“The business, my dear fellow, was concerned with another mutual friend of us all-with the late Victor Dean, who died, deeply regretted, upon a staircase. A remarkable young man, was he not?”
“In what way?” asked Milligan, quickly.
“Don’t you know? I thought you did. Otherwise, why am I here?”
“You two idiots make me tired,” broke in Dian. “Where’s the sense of going round and round each other like this? Your pompous cousin told us all about you, Mr. Bredon-I suppose you’ve got a Christian name, by the way?”
“I have. It’s spelt Death. Pronounce it any way you like. Most of the people who are plagued with it make it rhyme with teeth, but personally I think it sounds more picturesque when rhymed with breath. What did my amiable cousin say about me?”
“He said you were a dope-runner.”
“Where my cousin Wimsey gets his information from, I am damned if I know. Sometimes he is correct.”
“And you know perfectly well that one can get what one wants at Tod’s place. So why not come to the point?”
“As you say, why not? Is that the particular facet of my brilliant personality that interests you, Milligan?”
“Is that the particular facet of Victor Dean’s personality that interests you?”
“One point to me,” said Mr. Bredon. “Till this moment, I was not sure that it was a facet of his personality. Now I do. Dear me! How interesting it all is, to be sure.”
“If you can find out exactly how Victor Dean was involved in that show,” said Mr. Milligan, “it might be worth something to you and to me.”
“Say on.”
Major Milligan reflected a little and seemed to make up his mind to lay his cards on the table.
“Did you learn from Pamela Dean what her brother’s job was?”
“Yes, of course. He wrote advertising copy at a place called Pym’s. There’s no secret about that.”
“That’s just what there is. And if that infernal young fool hadn’t gone and got killed, we might have found out what it was and done ourselves a lot of good. As it is-”
“But look here, Tod,” said Dian. “I thought it was the other way round. I thought you were afraid of his finding out too much.”
“That’s true,” said Milligan, scowling. “What would be the use of it if he found out first?”
“I don’t follow all this,” said Bredon. “Wasn’t it his secret? Why not stop talking like a sensation novel and give us the dope straight?”
“Because I don’t believe you know even as much as I do about the fellow.”
“I don’t. I never met him in my life. But I know a good deal about Pym’s Publicity, Ltd.”
“How?”
“I work there.”
“What?”
“I work there.”
“Since when?”
“Since Dean’s death.”
“Because of Dean’s death, do you mean?”
“Yes.”
“How did that happen?”
“I received information, as my dear cousin Wimsey’s police pals would say, that Dean was on to something fishy about Pym’s. So, since most fish have gold in their mouths like St. Peter’s, I thought it wouldn’t do any harm to try a cast or two over that particular pool.”
“And what did you find?”
“My dear Milligan, you would make a cat laugh. I don’t give away information. I dispose of it-advantageously.”
“So do I.”
“As you like. You invited me here tonight. I wasn’t looking for you. But there’s one thing I don’t mind telling you, because I’ve already told Miss de Momerie, and that is, that Victor Dean was bumped off deliberately to prevent him from talking. So far, the only person I can discover who wanted him out of the way was yourself. The police might be interested to know that fact.”