"And how did you charge her?" I asked.
"I didn't. I said that the matter was off my beat, and gave her the address of a dog-fancier.
"She thanked me and went away, and ten minutes later left a box of chocolates and a bunch of flowers.
"Then they want to know the best musical comedy; the name of a play that it would be all right to take auntie to; the place to buy the best linen sheets; whether or not one has to dress in certain restaurants; what time the National Gallery opens; how long a car takes to Hampton Court; how to get Sunday tickets for the Zoo; and where one has the best chance of seeing the Prince of Wales.
"But what most of them want," said Ben, "is what they call a pied-à-terre. You've no idea what hosts of people there are who would be happy if they only had a foot to the earth!—in other words, a week-end cottage. The simplest place in the world, where they can rough it, you know; return to nature, shake the horrible city off! But when we come to particulars there must always be a tennis lawn, hot water laid on, bathroom and so forth. Sometimes they insist on a telephone. I could let twenty of these places a week; and there's nothing so difficult to find! As it is, most of the real country folk, the cottagers proper, have been dispossessed in order that their homes may be converted for week-end purposes.
"Another thing we are always being asked for is a man and his wife. But they are difficult to get, too, because if the man's any good, the wife isn't, and if the wife is capable, the man drinks.
"But most of them," she added, "I don't see at all. Jan or Dolly disposes of them; and of course they don't pay. But we can't be rude to them. And after all, if you call your office, 'The Beck and Call,' you are rather, as Dolly says, 'arstin' for it.' In fact, Dolly wants us to make a charge for everything. He produced some placards the other day, which he had spent all Sunday on, to be hung up. One was for his own desk with:—
LONDON QUESTIONS
ANSWERED TO THE
BEST OF OUR ABILITY
2/6 EACH
on it.
"And one was for Jan:—