Duplicate Death Read Free Page B

weigh with you, you will never get anywhere! Tut-tut, I thought better of you! What were you thinking about to waste your time entrapping me into matrimony when there was a whole, live baron waiting to be picked up? Or have you been misinformed? I shall, at what I trust may be some far distant date, inherit a baronetcy; but when you talk of independent means, you are speaking outside the book. Lawyers and clients being what they are, I am at this present very happy to appear in the dingiest of police courts for the modest fee of three-and-one, or even less; my well-groomed air of affluence being due to the generosity of my Papa, who makes me a handsome allowance. This is what comes of judging by appearances. I don't say that Guisborough is a rich man, but you should remember that a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush; and many a promising Communist has been persuaded by a good woman's influence to cut his hair, and abstain from wearing fancy ties."
    "Oh, Timothy, do shut up!" begged Beulah. "Besides, he's one of Cynthia Haddington's admirers!"
    "Well, considering the number of times you've cast it in my teeth that I too was one of her admirers, I can't see what that's got to do with it."
    "So you were!" said Beulah, with a touch of spirit. "If you hadn't been pursuing her, we should never have met!"
    Mr. Harte sighed. "If dancing three times with a girl to whom one had been presented at a private party, subsequently accepting an invitation to a ball given by her mother, and following this up with a civil call to return thanks, constitutes pursuit, I plead guilty," he said.
    "At all events," said Beulah somewhat viciously, "Mrs. Haddington regards you as the best of the eligibles! And if she knew I was having tea with you now she would probably give me the sack!"
    "In that case, you trot straight back to Charles Street, ducky, and tell her!" recommended Mr. Harte. "Pausing only to pay the bill here, I will burst off to procure a special licence so that we can be married tomorrow. You shall beguile some long winter's evening for me by recounting to me the circumstances which induced you to take a job as dog's body to that well-preserved corncrake."
    "If you want to know," responded Miss Birtley, "Dan Seaton-Carew got me the job! Now how do you feel about marrying me?"
    "Shaken but staunch. Seriously, how did that woman muscle on to the fringe of decent society?"
    "I don't know, but I think she was sort of sponsored by Lady Nest Poulton," said Beulah. "They're very thick, that I do know."
    "What times we do live in, to be sure! Poor old Greystoke has had to sell his place, of course, but I shouldn't have thought an Ellerbeck would have stooped quite as low."
    "That must be a thoroughly unfair remark!" said Beulah. "I know nothing about Lord Greystoke's circumstances, but everyone knows that Lady Nest's husband is rolling!"
    Just what I was thinking," agreed Timothy. "So what's the tie-up?"
    "Why should there be a tie-up?"
    "Because, my sweet, feather-headed nit-wit though she may be, and indeed is, the Lady Nest doesn't make a bosom-friend of a brassy-haired widow on the up-and-up without having some strong inducement so to do."
    "And they say women are spiteful!" exclaimed Beulah scornfully. "Do you also imagine there's a tie-up between her and Dan Seaton-Carew? She's a friend of his as well."
    "Good God!" said Timothy. "I wonder if there's any insanity in the Ellerbecks?"
    "Seaton-Carew is considered to be rather an attractive type."
    "What does he attract? Pond-life?"
    "Apparently, Lady Nest Poulton - if you call her a form of pond-life."
    "No, but an unsteady type. Sort of woman who used to go to Limehouse for a thrill in the wicked twenties. That may be it, of course - though I should rather describe your Charles Street set-up as a menagerie."
    "Really, Timothy!" she expostulated. "Lots of perfectly respectable people come to the house!"
    "I will grant you a sprinkling of fairly harmless types, who probably feel that