Lord Peter said: "Mary, don't be an ass."
"Yes," said the Dowager placidly. "I was going to suggest to you, Peter, that this Mr. Goyles—such a terrible name, Mary dear, I can't say I ever cared for it, even if there had been nothing else against him—especially as he would sign himself Geo. Goyles—G. e. o. you know, Mr. Parker, for George, and I never could help reading it as Gargoyles—I very nearly wrote to you, my dear, mentioning Mr. Goyles, and asking if you could see him in town, because there was something, when I came to think of it, about that ipecacuanha business that made me feel he might have something to do with it."
"Yes," said Peter, with a grin, "you always did find him a bit sickenin', didn't you?"
"How can you, Wimsey?" growled Parker reproachfully, with his eyes on Mary's face.
"Never mind him," said the girl. "If you can't be a gentleman, Peter—"
"Damn it all!" cried the invalid explosively. "Here's a fellow who, without the slightest provocation, plugs a bullet into my shoulder, breaks my collar-bone, brings me up head foremost on a knobbly second-hand brass bedstead and vamooses, and when, in what seems to me jolly mild, parliamentary language, I call him a sickenin' feller my own sister says I'm no gentleman. Look at me! In my own house, forced to sit here with a perfectly beastly headache, and lap up toast and tea, while you people distend and bloat yourselves on mixed grills and omelettes and a damn good vintage claret—"
"Silly boy," said the Duchess, "don't get so excited. And it's time for your medicine. Mr. Parker, kindly touch the bell."
Mr. Parker obeyed in silence. Lady Mary came slowly across, and stood looking at her brother.
"Peter," she said, "what makes you say that he did it?"
"Did what?"