In reality this was the strongest argument against the trip. Only by taking somebody into his confidence could such an adventure be undertaken. Diana was, of course, impossible. Gordon pinched his lip and rehearsed the terms in which he would convey to his agent the exact character of his journey. His attempt to put into words so remarkable and so unbelievable a project left him with a cold sense of dismay. Of all the people he thought likely he started with Bobbie; he also ended with Bobbie.
Robert G. Selsbury had an office on Mark Lane, where, from ten o’clock in the morning until four o’clock in the afternoon, he bought and sold tea, coffee and sugar to his own considerable profit. Gordon had only been to the office once. He thought it was rather stuffy and rather redolent of the two principal commodities in which Bobbie dealt. His own office in Queen Victoria Street was both rich and chaste and odourless, except for the faint fragrance of lavender—Gordon was strong for germicides, and that mostly employed to destroy the ravaging microbe had that suggestion of the lavender fields. Bobbie never came to see his brother without the sense that he ought to be wearing a boudoir cap and bedroom slippers.
The principal stockholder of R. G. Selsbury Ltd. was examining a sample of china tea when his brother was announced.
“Mr. Gordon?” asked Bobbie incredulously, and when the girl confirmed the tidings: “Push him in,” he said, and Gordon, who would have resented even the gentlest of pushes, entered unaided.
“What’s the matter?” asked Bobbie.
Gordon seated himself very carefully, put down his glossy silk hat on the table and slowly stripped his gloves.
“Robert, I’m rather in a tangle and I want you to help me out.”
“It can’t be money—it must be love. Who is she?”
“It is neither money nor love,” retorted Gordon with some asperity. “It is ... well, a delicate matter.”
Bobbie whistled, and a whistle can be very offensive.