This was arrant hubbub to the mere man who was not capable of carrying on a conversation except by the slow, primitive methods of Greek drama, strophe and antistrophe, one talking while the other listened, then vice versa.
So he had time to remember that he had something to remember, and to dig it up. He broke in on the dialogue:
“By the way, that reminds me, Marie Louise. There’s a man in town looking for you.”
“Looking for me!” Marie Louise gasped, alert as an antelope at once. “What was his name?”
“I can’t seem to recall it. I’ll have it in a minute. He 157 didn’t impress me very favorably, so I didn’t tell him you were living with us.”
Polly turned on Tom: “Come along, you poor nut! I hate riddles, and so does Marie Louise.”
“That’s it!” Tom cried. “Riddle––Nuddle. His name is Nuddle. Do you know a man named Nuddle?”
The name conveyed nothing to Marie Louise except a suspicion that Mr. Verrinder had chosen some pseudonym.
“What was his nationality?” she asked. “English?”
“I should say not! He was as Amurrican as a piece of pungkin pie.”