“Well—I don’t believe in it, you know. All right—don’t use language like that—you’ll frighten the girl at the Exchange. I’ll see what I can do. Eleven?—right!—Oh, I say!”
“Cluck!” said the telephone.
“Rung off,” said Parker, bitterly. “Bertha Gotobed. H’m! I could have sworn—”
He reached across to the breakfast-table for the Daily Yell, which was propped against the marmalade jar, and read with pursed lips a paragraph whose heavily leaded headlines had caught his eye, just before the interruption of the kipper episode.
“NIPPY” FOUND DEAD
IN EPPING FOREST
—
£5 Note in Hand-bag.
—
He took up the receiver again and asked for Wimsey’s number. The man-servant answered him.
“His lordship is in his bath, sir. Shall I put you through?”
“Please,” said Parker.
The telephone clucked again. Presently Lord Peter’s voice came faintly, “Hullo!”
“Did the landlady mention where Bertha Gotobed was employed?”