we proceed to the next address and repeat the performance.”
“Don’t be absurd, Tommy. Now for the other letter. Oh, this is from the
Ritz!”
“A hundred pounds instead of fifty!”
“I’ll read it:
“DEAR SIR,
“Re your advertisement, I should be glad if you would call round somewhere
about lunch-time. “Yours truly, “JULIUS
P. HERSHEIMMER.”
“Ha!” said Tommy. “Do I smell a Boche? Or only an American millionaire
of unfortunate ancestry? At all events we’ll call at lunch-time. It’s a good
time–frequently leads to free food for two.”
Tuppence nodded assent.
“Now for Carter. We’ll have to hurry.”
Carshalton Terrace proved to be an unimpeachable row of what Tuppence
called “ladylike looking houses.” They rang the bell at No. 27, and a neat maid
answered the door. She looked so respectable that Tuppence’s heart sank. Upon
Tommy’s request for Mr. Carter, she showed them into a small study on the ground
floor where she left them. Hardly a minute elapsed, however, before the door
opened, and a tall man with a lean hawklike face and a tired manner entered the
room.
“Mr. Y. A.?” he said, and smiled. His smile was distinctly attractive. “Do
sit down, both of you.”
They obeyed. He himself took a chair opposite to Tuppence and smiled at
her encouragingly. There was something in the quality of his smile that made
the girl’s usual readiness desert her.
As he did not seem inclined to open the conversation, Tuppence was forced
to begin.
“We wanted to know–that is, would you be so kind as to tell us anything
you know about Jane Finn?”
“Jane Finn? Ah!” Mr. Carter appeared to reflect. “Well, the question is,
what do you know about her?”
Tuppence drew herself up.
“I don’t see that that’s got anything to do with it.”
“No? But it has, you know, really it has.” He smiled again in his tired
way, and continued reflectively. “So that brings us down to it again. What do
you know about Jane Finn?
“Come now,” he continued, as Tuppence remained silent. “You must know
SOMETHING to have advertised as you did?” He leaned forward a little, his weary
voice held a hint of persuasiveness. “Suppose you tell me . . .”
There was something very magnetic about Mr. Carter’s personality. Tuppence
seemed to shake herself free of it with an effort, as she said:
“We couldn’t do that, could we, Tommy?”
But to her surprise, her companion did not back her up. His eyes were fixed
on Mr. Carter, and his tone when he spoke held an unusual note of deference.
“I dare say the little we know won’t be any good to you, sir. But such as
it is, you’re welcome to it.”
“Tommy!” cried out Tuppence in surprise.
Mr. Carter slewed round in his chair. His eyes asked a question.
Tommy nodded.
“Yes, sir, I recognized you at once. Saw you in France when I was with the
Intelligence. As soon as you came into the room, I knew—-”
Mr. Carter held up his hand.
“No names, please. I’m known as Mr. Carter here. It’s my cousin’s house,
by the way. She’s willing to lend it to me sometimes when it’s a case of
working on strictly unofficial lines. Well, now”–he looked from one to the
other–“who’s going to tell me the story?”
“Fire ahead, Tuppence,” directed Tommy. “It’s your yarn.”
“Yes, little lady, out with it.”
And obediently Tuppence did out with it, telling the whole story from the
forming of the Young Adventurers, Ltd., downwards.
Mr. Carter listened in silence with a resumption of his tired manner. Now
and then he passed his hand across his lips as though to hide a smile. When she
had finished he; nodded gravely.
“Not much. But suggestive. Quite suggestive. If you’ll excuse my saying
so, you’re a curious young couple. I don’t know–you might succeed where others
have failed . . . I believe in luck, you know–always have….”
He paused a moment, and then went on.
“Well, how about it? You’re out for adventure. How would you like to work
for me? All quite unofficial, you know. Expenses paid, and a moderate screw?”
Tuppence gazed at him, her lips parted, her eyes growing wider and wider.