"Is that all! It's too easy, Bob!"
"According to Pershore, it's easier still. He says it's a clear case against one person - young fellow, name of Butterwick."
"Well, if that's what he says, I've only got six people to interrogate - not counting the servants," said the Chief Inspector unkindly. "In fact, he may as well send young Butterwick off home to bed at once. I'd better get round there before he gets us all into trouble jugging a lot of innocent people. Let me have Sandy Grant, will you, Bob? Setting aside he knows my ways, once you get used to his silly habit of never giving you a straight yes or no, I'd sooner have him with me than any of the rest of them."
"I've already detailed him, and Sergeant Snettisham, to you."
"That's fine, but you don't have to go dragging Snettisham out of his bed at this hour: he's a married man, and I shan't need him tonight. Besides, I've got some consideration for other people, even if there are some that haven't."
"All right, all right! I'll send a car round to pick you up.:
"You're spoiling me!" said Hemingway, and rang off.
It was shortly before two in the morning that the police car drew up behind two others, and an ominous ambulance, outside Mrs. Haddington's house in Charles Street. Chief Inspector Hemingway, followed by the wiry, redheaded Inspector Grant of the CID, got out, and were admitted into the house by a uniformed constable, who saluted, and said that Inspector Pershore was awaiting them in the dining-room. Inspector Pershore came out of this room to greet them. He was a large, hard-faced man, with a consequential manner that had never yet failed to annoy the Chief Inspector. He took himself and his duties very seriously; and if Hemingway disliked him it was only fair to say that this dislike was cordially reciprocated. The higher Hemingway rose in the Department, the more important the cases that were entrusted to him, the less could Inspector Pershore understand the rules governing such promotion. He could not be brought to believe that anyone as incorrigibly flippant as the Chief Inspector could be what he called an efficient officer. He had been heard to express his astonishment at what the Chief Inspector's superiors put up with, and would certainly have been staggered to learn that no less a personage than the Assistant Commissioner had once said: "Put Hemingway on to it! He'll threaten to resign - but he'll bring home the bacon!"
"Good-evening, Chief Inspector!" said Pershore punctiliously. "Superintendent Hinckley informed me that he would be despatching you to the scene of the crime. I trust -"
"Well, there's no need for you to start talking like a newspaper report!" said Hemingway irritably. "What he told you was that he'd be sending me along, because nobody ever heard him talk in that silly style - not outside the witness-box, that is!" He put his hat down on the table under the gilded mirror, and struggled out of his overcoat. A glance round the eau-de-nil hall out of his bright, birdlike eyes made him nod approvingly. "Very classy!" he said. "Where can we go where we shan't be interrupted?"