"Oh, nothing," he said faintly. "Nothing at all."
They entered the living room to interrupt a scene of considerable excitement. Backing towards the wall, with a blank expression of alarm widening her eyes, Jacqueline Laine was staring dumbly at the small elderly gent, who was capering about in front of her like a frenzied redskin, spluttering yard after yard of his incomprehensible adenoidal honks interspersed with wild piercing squeaks apparently expressive of intolerable joy. In each hand he held an envelope aloft like a banner.
As his interpreter came in, he turned and rushed towards him, loosing off a fresh stream of noises like those of a hysterical duck.
"Mr. Ive is saying, sir," explained the interpreter, raising his voice harmoniously above the din, "that each of those envelopes bears a perfect example of the British Guiana one-cent magenta stamp of 1856, of which only one specimen was previously believed to exist. Mr. Ive is an ardent philatelist, sir, and these envelopes—"
Simon Templar blinked hazily at the small crudely printed stamp in the corner of the envelope which the little man was waving under his nose.
"You mean," he said cautiously, "that Mr. Ive is really only interested in the envelopes?"
"Yes sir."
"Not the letters themselves?"
"Not the letters."
"And he's been flapping around the house all this time trying to tell somebody about it?"