'Bill,' said Bundle desperately. 'I went to see Jimmy Thesiger yesterday morning.'
'Good old Jimmy,' said Bill. 'Well, as I was telling you, Babe's pretty smart. You've got to be nowadays. She can put it over on most theatrical people. If you want to live, be high-handed, that's what Babe says. And mind you, she's the goods all right. She can act – it's marvellous how that girl can act. She'd not much chance in 'Damn Your Eyes' – just swamped in a pack of good-looking girls. I said why not try the legitimate stage – you know, Mrs. Tanqueray – that sort of stuff – but Babe just laughed –'
'Have you seen Jimmy at all?'
'Saw him this morning. Let me see, where was I? Oh, yes, I hadn't got to the rumpus yet. And mind you it was jealousy – sheer, spiteful jealousy. The other girl wasn't a patch on Babe for looks and she knew it. So she went behind her back –'
Bundle resigned herself to the inevitable and heard the whole story of the unfortunate circumstances which had led up to Babe St. Maur's summary disappearance from the cast of 'Damn Your Eyes.' It took a long time.
When Bill finally paused for breath and sympathy, Bundle said: 'You're quite right, Bill, it's a rotten shame. There must be a lot of jealousy about –'
'The whole theatrical world's rotten with it.'
'It must be. Did Jimmy say anything to you about coming down to the Abbey next week?'
For the first time, Bill gave his attention to what Bundle was saying.
'He was full of a long rigmarole he wanted me to stuff Codders with. About wanting to stand in the Conservative interest. But you know, Bundle, it's too damned risky.'
'Stuff,' said Bundle. 'If George does find him out, he won't blame you. You'll just have been taken in, that's all.'
'That's not it at all,' said Bill. 'I mean it's too damned risky for Jimmy. Before he knows where he is, he'll be parked down somewhere like Tooting West, pledged to kiss babies and make speeches. You don't know how thorough Codders is and how frightfully energetic.'
'Well, we'll have to risk that,' said Bundle. 'Jimmy can take care of himself all right.'
'You don't know Codders,' repeated Bill.
'Who's coming to this party, Bill? Is it anything very special?'
'Only the usual sort of muck. Mrs. Macatta for one.'
'The M.P.?'
'Yes, you know, always going off the deep end about Welfare and Pure Milk and Save the Children. Think of poor Jimmy being talked to by her.'
'Never mind Jimmy. Go on telling me.'
'Then there's a Hungarian, what they call a Young Hungarian. Countess something unpronounceable. She's all right.'
He swallowed as though embarrassed, and Bundle observed that he was crumbling his bread nervously.
'Young and beautiful?' she inquired delicately.
'Oh, rather.'
'I didn't know George went in for female beauty much.'
'Oh, he doesn't. She runs baby feeding in Buda Pesth – something like that. Naturally she and Mrs. Macatta want to get together.'
'Who else?'
'Sir Stanley Digby –'
'The Air Minister?'
'Yes. And his secretary, Terence O'Rourke. He's rather a lad, by the way – or used to be in his flying days. Then there's a perfectly poisonous German chap called Herr Eberhard. I don't know who he is, but we're all making the hell of a fuss about him. I've been twice told off to take him out to lunch, and I can tell you, Bundle, it was no joke. He's not like the Embassy chaps, who are all very decent. This man sucks in soup and eats peas with a knife. Not only that, but the brute is always biting his finger-nails – positively gnaws at them.'
'Pretty foul.'
'Isn't it? I believe he invents things – something of the kind. Well, that's all. Oh, yes, Sir Oswald Coote.'
'And Lady Coote?'
'Yes, I believe she's coming too.'
Bundle sat lost in thought for some minutes. Bill's list was suggestive, but she hadn't time to think out various possibilities just now. She must get on to the next point.
'Bill,' she said, 'what's all this about Seven Dials?'
Bill at once looked horribly embarrassed. He blinked and avoided her glance.
'I don't know what you mean,' he said.
'Nonsense,' said Bundle. 'I was told you know all about it.'
'About what?'
This was rather a poser. Bundle shifted her ground.
'I don't see what you want to be so secretive for,' she complained.
'Nothing to be secretive about. Nobody goes there much now. It was only a craze.'
This sounded puzzling.
'One gets so out of things when one is away,' said Bundle in a sad voice.
'Oh, you haven't missed much,' said Bill. 'Everyone went there just to say they had been. It was boring really, and, my God, you can get tired of fried fish.'
'Where did everyone go?'
'To the Seven Dials Club, of course,' said Bill, staring. 'Wasn't that what you were asking about?'
'I didn't know it by that name,' said Bundle.
'Used to be a slummy sort of district round about Tottenham Court Road way. It's all pulled down and cleaned up now. But the Seven Dials Club keeps to the old atmosphere. Fried fish and chips. General squalor. Kind of East End stunt, but awfully handy to get at after a show.'
'It's a night club, I suppose,' said Bundle. 'Dancing and all that?'
'That's it. Awfully mixed crowd. Not a posh affair. Artists, you know, and all sorts of odd women and a sprinkling of our lot. They say quite a lot of things, but I think that that's all bunkum myself, just said to make the place go.'
'Good,' said Bundle. 'We'll go there tonight.'
'Oh! I shouldn't do that,' said Bill. His embarrassment had returned. 'I tell you it's played out. Nobody goes there now.'
'Well, we're going.'
'You wouldn't care for it, Bundle. You wouldn't really.'
'You're going to take me to the Seven Dials Club and nowhere else, Bill. And I should like to know why you are so unwilling?'
'I? Unwilling?'
'Painfully so. What's the guilty secret?'
'Guilty secret?'
'Don't keep repeating what I say. You do it to give yourself time.'
'I don't,' said Bill indignantly. 'It's only –'
'Well? I know there's something. You never can conceal anything.'
'I've got nothing to conceal. It's only –'
'Well?'
'It's a long story – You see, I took Babe St. Maur there one night –'
'Oh! Babe St. Maur again.'
'Why not?'
'I didn't know it was about her –' said Bundle, stifling a yawn.
'As I say, I took Babe there. She rather fancied a lobster. I had a lobster under my arm –'
The story went on – When the lobster had been finally dismembered in a struggle between Bill and a fellow who was a rank outsider. Bundle brought her attention back to him.
'I see,' she said. 'And there was a row?'
