Mr. Hollis looked at his visitor with suspicion. “You appear to be selecting the very letters which I have,” he remarked.
“Those which—er—would make up the—er—legend, ‘Marvelous Man-Like Monster,” drawled Average Jones.
“Then you know the Farleys,” said the print man.
“The Flying Farleys?” said Average Jones. “They used to do ascensions with firework trimmings, didn’t they? No; I don’t exactly know them. But I’d like to.”
“That’s another matter,” retorted Mr. Hollins, annoyed at having betrayed himself. “This type is decidedly a private—even a secret-order. I had no right to say anything about it or the customers who ordered it.”
“Still, you could see that a letter left here for them reached them, I suppose.”
After some hesitation, the other agreed. Average Jones sat down to the composition of an epistle, which should be sufficiently imperative without being too alarming. Having completed this delicate task to his satisfaction he handed the result to Hollins.
“If you haven’t already struck off a line, you might do so,” he suggested. “I’ve asked the Farleys for a print of it; and I fancy they’ll be sending for one.”
Leaving the shop he went direct to a telegraph office, whence he dispatched two messages to Harwick. One was to the Reverend Peter Prentice, the other was to the local chief of police. On the following afternoon Mr. Prentice trembling in the anteroom of the Ad-Visor’s. With the briefest word of greeting Average Jones led him into his private office, where a clear-eyed boy, with his head swathed in bandages sat waiting. As the Ad-Visor closed the door after him, he heard the breathless, boyish “Hello, father,” merged in the broken cry of the Reverend Peter Prentice.
Five minutes he gave father and son. When he returned to the room, carrying a loose roll of reddish paper, he was followed by a strange couple. The woman was plumply muscular. Her attractive face was both defiant and uneasy. Behind her strode a wiry man of forty. His chief claim to notice lay in an outrageously fancy waistcoat, which was ill-matched with his sober, commonplace, “pepper-and-salt” suit.