“Well, Mr Brime,” said a voice at his elbow, “did Mrs Lampton take the gentleman in?”
“Eh? Oh, I don’t know, as I didn’t stop. But she’d be sure to.”
“Oh, yes, it will be all right,” said Wimble. “But you’ll come in, Mr Brime?”
“No. I think I’ll get back now, and finish my pipe by the cliff.”
“With a beard like that, sir? Better have it off.”
“Eh? No, it isn’t shaving day.”
“Your beard grows wonderfully fast, Mr Brime, believe me, sir. I wonder at a young man like you being so careless of his personal appearance. You’ll be wanting to marry some day, sir, and there’s nothing goes further with the ladies than seeing a man clean-shaved.”
It was not quite a random shot, for Wimble had wheedled out a little respecting the gardener’s future, and he had only to draw back with a smile for the man to follow him in, passing his hand thoughtfully over his chin, wondering whether it had anything to do with the very severe rebuff he had more than once received.
Once more in the chair, tied up in the cloth, and with his face lathered, he was at Wimble’s mercy; and as the razor played about his nose and chin, giving a scrape here and a scrape there, the barber cross-examined the gardener in a quiet, unconcerned way, that would have been the envy of an Old Bailey counsel. In very few minutes he had drawn out everything that the gardener had learned, and so insidiously soft were the operator’s words, that Brime found himself unconsciously inventing and supplying particulars that the barber stowed up in his brain cell, ready for future use.
“There, Mr Brime,” he said, after delivering the final upper strokes with a dexterity that was perfect, though thrilling, from the danger they suggested, “I think you will say, sir, that a good shave is not dear at the price.”