accidental,' they told him. 'This man Piper evidently set out with deliberate malice to ruin the reputation of the Professor. There can be no other explanation. In our opinion the author is entirely culpable.'
'He also happens to be dead,' said Geoffrey.
'In that case it rather looks as though you are going to have to bear the entire costs of this action and, frankly, we would advise you to settle.'
Geoffrey Corkadale left the solicitors' office in despair. It was all that bloody man Frensic's fault. He should have known better than to have dealt with a literary agent who had already been involved in one disastrous libel action. Frensic was libel-prone. There was no other way of looking at it. Geoffrey took a cab to Lanyard Lane. He was going to tell Frensic what he thought of him. He found Frensic in an unusually affable mood.
'My dear Geoffrey, how very nice to see you,' he said.
'I haven't come to exchange compliments,' said Geoffrey, 'I've come to tell you that you've landed me in the most appalling mess and...'
Frensic raised a hand.
'You mean Professor Facit? Oh I shouldn't worry too much...'
'Worry too much? I've got every right to worry and as for too much, with bankruptcy staring me in the face just how much is too much?'
'I've been making some private enquiries,' said Frensic, 'in Oxford.'
'You have?' said Geoffrey. 'You don't mean to say he actually did do all those frightful things? That ghastly Pekinese for instance?'
'I mean,' said Frensic pontifically, 'that no one in Oxford has ever heard of a Professor Facit. I've checked with the Lodging House Syndicate and the university library and they have no records of any Professor Facit ever having applied for a ticket to use the library. And as for his statement that he once lived in De Frytville Avenue, it's quite untrue.'
'Good Lord,' said Geoffrey, 'if nobody up there has ever heard of him...'
'It rather looks as if Messrs Ridley, Coverup, Makeweight and Jones have just tried to ambulance-chase once too often and are hoist with their own petard.'
'My dear fellow, this calls for a celebration,' said Geoffrey. 'And you mean to say you went up there and found all this out...'
But Frensic was modesty itself. 'You see, I knew Piper pretty well. After all he had been sending me stuff for years,' he said as they went downstairs, 'and he wasn't the sort of fellow to set out to libel someone deliberately.'
'But I thought you told me that Pause was his first book,' said Geoffrey.
Frensic regretted his indiscretion. 'His first real book,' he said. 'The rest was just...well, a bit derivative. Not the sort of stuff I could ever have sold.'
They strolled across to Wheeler's for lunch. Talking of Oxford,' said Geoffrey when they had ordered, 'I had the most extraordinary phone call this morning from some lunatic woman called Bogden.'
'Really?' said Frensic, spilling dry Martini down his shirt front. 'What did she want?'
'She claimed I'd asked her to marry me. It was absolutely awful.'
'It must have been,' said Frensic, finishing his drink and ordering another. 'Mind you, some women will go to any lengths...'
'From what I could gather I was the one to have gone to any lengths. Said I'd bought her an engagement ring.'
'I hope you told her to go to hell,' said Frensic, 'and talking of marriages I've got some news too. Sonia Futtle is going to marry Hutchmeyer.'
'Marry Hutchmeyer?' said Geoffrey. 'But the man's only just lost his wife. You'd think he'd have the decency to wait a bit before sticking his head in the noose again.'
'An apt metaphor,' said Frensic with a smile, and raised his glass.
