CHAPTER VI CHILDREN OF SHADOW
'A Politician! I'd as soon be a policeman,' remarked Miles Childwick, with delicate scorn. 'I don't dispute the necessity of either—I never dispute the necessity of things—but it would not occur to me to become either.'
'You're not tall enough for a policeman, anyhow,' said Elfreda Flood.
'Not if it became necessary to take you in charge, I admit' (Elfreda used to be called 'queenly' and had played Hippolyta), 'but your remark is impertinent in every sense of the term. Politicians and policemen are essentially the same.'
Everybody looked at the clock. They were waiting for supper at the Magnifique; it was Tommy Trent's party, and the early comers sat in a group in the luxurious outer room.
'From what I know of policemen in the witness-box, I incline to agree,' said Manson Smith.
'The salaries, however, are different,' yawned Tommy, without removing his eyes from the clock.
'I'm most infernally hungry,' announced Arty Kane, a robust-looking youth, somewhat famous as a tragic poet. 'Myra Lacrimans' was perhaps his best-known work.