Bones in London - Edgar Wallace [58]
“Very naughty, very unpatriotic,” murmured the palpitating Bones, and then the girl laughed.
“It has its funny side,” she said. “Mr Seepidge pretended that he was carrying out a legitimate order – a book of poems. Isn’t that absurd?”
“Ha, ha!” said Bones hollowly.
“Listen,” said the girl, and read: “The magistrate, in sentencing Seepidge to six months’ hard labour, said that there was no doubt that the man had been carrying on an illegal business. He had had the effrontery to pretend that he was printing a volume of verse. The court had heard extracts from that precious volume, which had evidently been written by Mr Seepidge’s office-boy. He had never read such appalling drivel in his life. He ordered the confiscated lottery prospectuses to be destroyed, and he thought he would be rendering a service to humanity if he added an order for the destruction of this collection of doggerel.”
The girl looked up at Bones.
“It is curious that we should have been talking about poetry today, isn’t it?” she asked. “Now, Mr Tibbetts, I’m going to insist upon your bringing that book of yours tomorrow.”
Bones, very flushed of face, shook his head. “Dear old disciple,” he said huskily, “another time…another time…poetry should be kept for years…like old wine…”
“Who said that?” she asked, folding her paper and rising.
“Competent judges,” said Bones, with a gulp.
THE LAMP THAT NEVER WENT OUT
“Have you seen her?” asked Bones.
He put this question with such laboured unconcern that Hamilton put down his pen and glared suspiciously at his partner.
“She’s rather a beauty,” Bones went on, toying with his ivory paper. knife. “She has one of those dinky bonnets, dear old thing, that makes you feel awfully braced with life.”
Hamilton gasped. He had seen the beautiful Miss Whitland enter the office half an hour before, but he had not noticed her head-dress.
“Her body’s dark blue, with teeny red stripes,” said Bones dreamily, “and all her fittings are nickel-plated–”
“Stop!” commanded Hamilton hollowly. “To what unhappy woman are you referring in this ribald fashion?”
“Woman!” splattered the indignant Bones. “I’m talking about my car.”
“Your car?
“My car,” said Bones, in the off-handed way that a sudden millionaire might refer to “my earth.”
“You’ve bought a car?”
Bones nodded.
“It’s a jolly good ’bus,” he said. “I thought of running down to Brighton on Sunday.”
Hamilton got up and walked slowly across the room with his hands in his pockets.
“You’re thinking of running down to Brighton, are you?” he said. “Is it one of those kind of cars where you have to do your own running?”
Bones, with a good-natured smile, also rose from his desk and walked to the window.
“My car,” he said, and waved his hand to the street.
By craning his neck, Hamilton was able to get a view of the patch of roadway immediately in front of the main entrance to the building. And undoubtedly there was a car in waiting – a long, resplendent machine that glittered in the morning sunlight.
“What’s the pink cushion on the seat?” asked Hamilton.
“That’s not a pink cushion, dear old myoptic,” said Bones calmly; “that’s my chauffeur – Ali ben Ahmed.”
“Good lor!” said the impressed Hamilton. “You’ve a nerve to drive into the City with a sky-blue Kroo boy.”
Bones shrugged his shoulders.
“We attracted a certain amount of attention,” he admitted, not without satisfaction.
“Naturally,” said Hamilton, going back to his desk. “People thought you were advertising Pill Pellets for Pale Poultry. When did you buy this infernal machine?”
Bones, at his desk, crossed his legs and put his fingers together.
“Negotiations, dear old Ham, have been in progress for a month,” he recited. “I have been taking lessons on the quiet, and today – proof!” He took out his pocket-book and threw a paper with a lordly air towards his partner. It fell halfway