Appleby's Answer Read Free Page B

schoolmaster’. Schoolmasters nowadays are liable to be people who go on strike, and thus definitely align themselves with the lower orders. ‘A college tutor?’ she ventured.
    â€˜A coach, madam. An old-fashioned crammer. Lads going into the Services mostly. Usually the Brigade.’
    â€˜Yes, of course.’ This ready confirmation was rashly offered, since it turned upon Captain Bulkington’s own possession of martial status, which was something she was not supposed to know about.
    â€˜Enjoyed your yarn very much,’ the Captain said easily. ‘Deuced ingenious. Dashed if I know how you people think of these things. Ladies particularly.’
    â€˜Women, as it happens, have been outstandingly successful at writing detective stories.’
    â€˜Perfectly true, perfectly true. Noticed it myself, ’pon my word.’
    â€˜It is what first directed my own attention to that branch of literature.’
    â€˜Jolly good. Dashed fortunate, if I may say so. World deprived of a lot of pleasure – innocent pleasure, eh? – if you’d taken up tragedies, or anything morbid of that sort.’
    â€˜I have always liked to think so.’ Miss Pringle had flushed with satisfaction, for this was a genuine persuasion of her own. ‘There are times when an absorbing yarn – you have used entirely the right word – provides distraction and solace, does it not? Times of anxiety, periods of illness or convalescence, even occasions of bereavement.’
    â€˜Bereavement?’ Captain Bulkington looked doubtful. ‘I’m not sure about that. Too much sudden death in your sort of thing, if you ask me, to be just right for reading after a funeral. Better than poetry, of course. When my poor father died – he had been in the regiment before me – the padre said he was sending me something called In Memoriam . Thought it would be one of those little notices you pay for in a newspaper. Turned out to be an interminable thing by Tennyson. Ring out wild bells, and so-forth. Queer stuff.’
    â€˜But extremely melodious,’ Miss Pringle demurred. She didn’t know quite what to make of this summary judgement. The Captain, presumably, employed an assistant to instruct his charges in English literature. ‘May I ask if you are a regular reader of detective fiction?’
    â€˜Regular?’ Rather oddly, the Captain gave an impression of shying away from this. ‘Pick one up on a bookstall from time to time. Or from our local library. Couple of shelves of them there. Grubby, rather. But dashed impracticable, most of them.’ Captain Bulkington suddenly relapsed into his former gloom. ‘I suppose you have to read the lot,’ he said, rousing himself. ‘Make sure somebody hasn’t had the idea before.’
    â€˜Well, that can be an anxiety. Of course, one talks to one’s fellow practitioners – to one’s confrères .’
    â€˜And one’s consoeurs too, eh? Ha-ha!’ This learned witticism, although it struck Miss Pringle as displeasing, appeared to amuse Captain Bulkington very much.
    â€˜Something of the kind is the object of my present journey.’ It was an occasion of gratification to Miss Pringle that she now had a secure footing among men (and women) of letters. She never failed to attend cocktail parties at the invitation of publishers; she went to lectures of a superior sort, followed by tea and discussion, such as are organised by the National Book League and the Society of Authors; she had even been given dinner by a distinguished fan in a rearward region of the Athenaeum. ‘I have recently been elected to membership of the Crooks’ Colloquium. Tonight is the occasion of our annual dinner. We call it the Diner Dupin . A little joke.’
    â€˜Crooks’ Colloquium?’ the Captain repeated blankly. ‘Dupin?’
    â€˜Perhaps it ought really to be Tecs’ Colloquium – only