He threw himself into a chair and mopped his forehead.
“Why the devil don’t you open a window?”
“I didn’t notice,” said Godfrey, and went and threw up the sash.
It was a cosy room at the back of the house, the smoking den of the late dead owner, furnished with green leather arm-chairs drawn up at each end of a green leather-covered fender-seat, with a great green leather-cushioned Chesterfield, with solid comfortable mahogany tables, writing-desk and bookcases. On the walls hung well-framed old engravings of solid worth, and Godfrey had added a little armoury of war trophies, Hun helmets, rifles, flare pistols, gas-masks, bayonets, gleaming shell cases of all sizes, a framed blood-stained letter or two in German script. . . . A cosy room more suitable for a winter’s evening than a close summer afternoon. Baltazar filled his lungs with the fresher air.
“That’s better,” said he.
Godfrey stood by the fireplace, his face set and unyielding.
“Perhaps you might tell me, sir, what has happened. What brought Donnithorpe to the station?”
“The hope of catching you, my son, in flagrante delicto of elopement.”
“Quong Ho was sure that he wanted you.”
“Quong Ho made a mistake. Donnithorpe was exceedingly surprised to find me.”