“Calvert, when I think what I’ve been through with that beastly limpet, jabbering all day and hysterics all night—it’s nothing short of a miracle that I didn’t bash her head against the anchor and feed her to the crocodiles. Who the devil is she, anyway?”
“Daisy de Vallorosa? My dear chap, why ask me?”
“Well, I do ask you. She seems to know who you are all right!”
“Does she, indeed? Upon my word, that’s interesting!”
He cocked his head attentively, guileless and inscrutable.
“Yes, she does indeed. Come on—let me in on this! Did she honestly come up here to get help for a brother dying in the tin mines, or is this a rendezvous that the two of you fixed up in Singapore?”
His host looked shocked but magnanimous.
“William, William—no, frankly, you appall me! What a sordid mind you have under that sunny exterior; out upon you! I never make rendezvous—absolutely not.”
“Well, she swore that she’d met you and Bhakdi at a special concert while he was visiting Singapore.”
“Oh, extremely special,” murmured the Honourable Tony, a reminiscent gleam in his eye. “Rather! She sang some little songs that were quite as special as anything I’ve ever heard in my life, and at one time or another I’ve heard a good few. Bhakdi was most frightfully bowled over; he gave her two hammered gold buckles and a warm invitation to drop in on him at any time that she was in the neighbourhood. I rather fancy that that’s what’s at the bottom of all this; taking one thing with another, I’m inclined to believe that Necessity became a Mother again when our little Daisy barged into you, and that the expiring brother is simply one of her inventive offspring. Hence, death and the tin mines! By the way, just how did the young female barge into you?”