"Some drinks, Borieff."
Simon took out his cigarette case while Borieff slouched over to a cupboard under one of the bookshelves and brought out a bottle and a siphon.
"You know, this makes me feel quite guilty," he said. "I've had so many drinks with you before, and yet I've never bought you one."
"Two vanloads, isn't it?" Lasser agreed with his fat bright smile. "And the other van with — um — silks and things in it. Yes. Yes. That's what I brought you here to talk to you about. We shall have to have those vans back, of course, what you haven't actually used of them."
"Hoppy certainly has rather improved the shining hour," Simon admitted. "But there's quite a lot left. What sort of an offer were you thinking of making?"
Lasser shook his head.
"No," he said judiciously. "No, I wasn't thinking of making an offer. I just want them back. I'm afraid you're going to have to tell us where to find them. That's why I arranged for you to come here."
"What's all this," Brenda Marlow asked quietly, "about bringing them here?"
She had been so much in the background that the others seemed to have forgotten her, and when she spoke it was as startling an intrusion as if she had not been there before and had just walked in. Lasser looked round at her, blinking.
"Eh?"