“It’s nothing for Mr. Faulkner to buy a new instrument if it’s needed, but it’s a serious thing if a dance that Mrs. Faulkner gives is interrupted. Money is no consideration here as you ought to know.”
The piano man, remembering the price that was exacted for the special case, smiled to himself. It would be better for him to sell a new instrument. It would not surprise him if this affable secretary called in some fine morning and hinted at commission. Such things had been done before in the trade.
“It’s just as you say,” he returned. “At what hour shall our Mr. Jackson call?”
“As soon as he likes after ten,” said the obliging Trent, and rang off.
Then he called up the Carr Faulkner house and told the answering man servant that Mr. Jackson of Stoneham’s would call at half past six. He was switched on to the private wire of Mrs. Carr Faulkner.
“It’s disgraceful that you can’t come before,” she stormed.
“Yours is specially made instrument,” he reminded her, “and I need special tools.”
Then he took the crosstown car to his home and changed into a neat dark business suit. He also arrayed himself in a brand new shirt and collar. Mrs. Kinney always washed these, and many a criminal has had his identity proved by his laundry mark. Trent, like a wise man, admitted the possibility that some day he might be caught but was determined never to take the risks that lesser craftsmen hardly thought of.
Anthony Trent thought it most probable that the Faulkner’s butler would be of the imported species. He hoped so. He found that they were more easily impressed by good manners and dress than the domestic breed.
Some day he determined to write an essay on butlers. There was Conington Warren’s bishop-like Austin, cold, severe, aloof. There was Guestwick’s man, the jovial sportsman type molding himself no doubt on some admired employer of earlier days.