“Remanded for inquiries—that’ll do for him, sir,” said Bell’s voice. “And she can wait. Hope you’re all right, Mr. Fortune.”
“I’m suffering from shock, Bell. Mr. Lomas is shocking me. He’s begun to sit up and take notice.”
Inadequately fed and melancholy, Mr. Fortune was borne into Paddington by a quarter-past twelve. He there beheld Lomas sitting in Lomas’s car and regarding him with a satirical eye. Mr. Fortune entered the car in dignity and silence.
“My dear fellow, I hate to disappoint you,” Lomas smiled. “You’ve done wonderfully well. Arrested a chauffeur, driven a lady to suicide—admirable. It is really your masterpiece. Art for art’s sake in the grand style. You must find it horribly disappointing to act with a dull fellow like me.”
“I do,” said Mr. Fortune.
Lomas chuckled. “I know, I know. I can’t help seeing it. And really I hate to spoil your work. But the plain fact is I’ve got the body.”
“Well, well,” said Mr. Fortune.
“And unfortunately—I really do sympathize with you—it isn’t dead.”
“When did I say it was?” said Mr. Fortune. “I said you hadn’t a corpse for me—and you haven’t got one now. I said it was all muddled—and so it is, a dam’ muddle.”
“Don’t you want to know why the fair Sylvia left home?”