“I’m highly flattered. She’s the only one of you who took the trouble to write to me from time to time when I was out yonder. All my Ravensthorpe news came through her.”
Cecil was rather discomfited by this reminder. He changed the subject abruptly.
“I suppose you’ll come as Sherlock Holmes? Joan’s laid down that every one must act up to their costume, whatever it is; and Sherlock wouldn’t give you much trouble after all your detective experience. You’d only have to snoop round and pick up clues and make people uncomfortable with deductions.”
Sir Clinton seemed amused by the idea.
“A pretty programme! Something like this, I suppose?” he demanded, and gave a faintly caricatured imitation of the Holmes mannerisms.
“By Jove, you know, that’s awfully good!” Cecil commented, rather taken aback by the complete change in Sir Clinton’s voice and gait. “You ought to do it. You’d get first prize easily.”
Sir Clinton shook his head as he resumed his natural guise.
“The mask wouldn’t cover my moustache; and I draw the line at shaving that off, even in a good cause. Besides, a Chief Constable can’t go running about disguised as Sherlock Holmes. Rather bad taste, dragging one’s trade into one’s amusements. No, I’ll come as something quite unostentatious: a pillar-box or an Invisible Man, or a spook, probably.”
“I forgot,” Cecil hastened to say, apologetically, “I shouldn’t have asked you about your costume. Joan’s very strong on some fancy regulation she’s made that no one is to know beforehand what anyone else is wearing. She wants the prize awarding to be absolutely unbiased. So you’d better not tell me what you’re going to do.”
Sir Clinton glanced at him with a faint twinkle in his eye.