Mr Campion’s personality was a difficult one to take seriously; it was not easy, for instance, to decide when he was lying and when he was not. Abbershaw had reckoned upon his thrust going home, and although it had obviously done so he did not seem to have gained any advantage by it.
Prenderby, however, was entirely in the dark, and now he broke in upon the conversation with curiosity.
‘Here, I say, I don’t get this,’ he said. ‘Who and what is Mr Mornington Dodd?’
Abbershaw threw out his hand, indicating Mr Albert Campion.
‘That gentleman,’ he said, ‘is Mornington Dodd.’
Albert Campion smiled modestly. In spite of his obvious pain he was still lively.
‘In a way yes, and in a way no,’ he said, fixing his eyes on Abbershaw. ‘Mornington Dodd is one of my names. I have also been called the “Honourable Tootles Ash”, which I thought was rather neat when it occurred to me. Then there was a girl who used to call me “Cuddles” and a man at the Guards Club called me something quite different –’
‘Campion, this is not a joke.’ Abbershaw spoke sternly. ‘However many and varied your aliases have been, now isn’t the time to boast of them. We are up against something pretty serious now.’
‘My dear man, don’t I know it?’ said Mr Campion peevishly, indicating the state of his shoulders. ‘Even better than you do, I should think,’ he said dryly.
‘Now look here,’ said Abbershaw, whose animosity could not but be mollified by this extraordinary naïveté, ‘you know something about this business, Campion – that is your name, I suppose?’