on earth did you know I was here?'
He grinned in return. After all that he had been through to find her he couldn't help it.
'Haven't you heard about me?' he said. 'I do these tricks for my living.'
'Of course,' she said. 'I always knew you were supposed to be frightfully clever, but I didn't really believe you were as clever as all that. . . . Oh well, we live and learn, and anyhow you haven't got it all your own way. I think I was pretty clever myself, the way I got away from your house. I worked it all out before I went to bed last night. Don't you think it was clever of me?'
'Very clever,' he agreed. 'But you see it was just the way I expected you to be clever.'
She stared at him.
'The way you . . .'
'Yes.'
'But you don't mean you——'
'Naturally,' he lied calmly. 'I knew that if you got away, the first thing you'd do would be to get hold of those papers, wherever you'd left them. I wanted to know where they were, and I didn't want to have to beat it out of you. So I just let you get away and fetch them for me.'
'I don't believe you!'
'Would you like me to tell you all about it? I was behind you all the time. You picked up the ticket at the South Kensington post office, and then you went on and collected the package from the checkroom at Paddington. You took the first train down here, and you were driven up from the station by a bloke with no roof to his mouth and one of the oldest taxis on the road. Does that help?'
She looked as crestfallen as a child that has had a succulent lollipop snatched out of its mouth.
'I think you're beastly,' she said.
'I know. Pigs move pointedly over to the other end of the sty when I come in. And now suppose you tell me what those papers were doing at Paddington.'
'That's easy. You see I had them with me when I was coming down here for last week end, because of course I hadn't read them, and I was going to read them on the train and give them back to Johnny when I saw him. Then I thought if they had all these things in them that were so rude about Algy and General Sangore and the rest of them, perhaps I'd better not take them down with me, because Algy mightn't like it. So I just popped them in the cloakroom meaning to collect them on my way back. But then the fire happened, and—and everything, and I came back in Mr Luker's car, and what with one thing and another I forgot all about them until you started talking about them at the Berkeley. So after last night I thought I'd better see what they were all about.'
'And what are they all about?'
'I don't know yet, but they look rather dull. You see, I'd only just started to look at them when you came in. I didn't like to open them on the train, because there were always other people in the carriage, and I didn't know if they might not see something they shouldn't see. . . . You can look at them with me if you like. As a matter of fact, I—I meant you to have them anyway.'
Simon gazed at her with the admiration reserved for very special occasions.
'Darling,' he said, 'how can I ever have managed to misjudge you?'
'But I did, really. You don't think I'd have let Algy have them after what happened last night, do you?'
