Amberley transferred his gaze to the fireplace. After; i moment Collins said politely: "Will there be anything further, sir?"
"No, that's all," said Fountain. He waited till the mai > had gone and then remarked that he had managed to find a butler to take Dawson's place.
"Really? I heard you had gone to town to intervue one. Satisfactory?"
"Seems all right," said Fountain. "He had a very good reference, though I'd have preferred to have had a word over the phone with his late employers. Unfortunately the man's gone to America. He gave Baker - that's the butler - a chit, but one never knows with these references that servants hand you themselves. However, he was willing to come at once, so I decided to give him a trial. Been out of work for a month or two on account of his health. Hope he won't turn out to be a crook." He held out an open box of cigars, but remembering that his guest did not smoke them, looked round for the cigarettes.
Amberley shook his head, and produced a pipe and began to fill it. "What was it you were going to tell me?" he asked.
The story was rather an odd one. The incident had occurred two years before, when Fountain succeeded his uncle. He had known when he took over the house and the existing staff that the servants had each one whole day off a month, in addition to their various half-days. The arrangement had seemed to him a fair one; in any case he did not wish to make any changes in the rules of the house. Dawson alone of them all was favoured with late leave, which meant that he was not bound to be in by ten o'clock at night on these occasions. This was because he was supposed always to visit his sister, who lived at Brixton, a difficult place to reach from Upper Nettlefold. Fountain had never questioned it until, happening to be dining in town on one of Dawson's off days, whom should he have seen three tables away but Dawson himself, in company with another man.
Mr. Amberley raised his brows, but made no comment.
The restaurant was the Magnificent - a tawdry, gilded place, certainly, but not exactly cheap. Probably Amberley knew it?
Amberley nodded and put his pipe between his teeth and felt in his pocket for matches.
Well, he had been surprised, but since it was really no business of his what Dawson did in his off time he had pretended not to notice the man. But on the following morning Dawson had broached the matter of his own accord. He said that he knew his master must have wondered to see him dining at the Magnificent, and he wished to explain how it had come about. The explanation had appeared to Fountain quite satisfactory; so much so that the incident had been banished from his mind only to be recalled when, worrying his brain over the man's murder, he had set himself to think over everything he had ever known of Dawson.