“That’s your idea, is it, Bunter? Noblesse oblige—for a consideration. I daresay you’re right. Then you’re better off than I am, because I’d have to behave myself to Lady Worthington if I hadn’t a penny. Bunter, if I sacked you here and now, would you tell me what you think of me?”
“You’d have a perfect right to, my Bunter, and if I sacked you on top of drinking the kind of coffee you make, I’d deserve everything you could say of me. You’re a demon for coffee, Bunter—I don’t want to know how you do it, because I believe it to be witchcraft, and I don’t want to burn eternally. You can buy your cross-eyed lens.”
“Well, come back when you have. I have many things to tell you. Hullo! who’s that?”
“Unless it’s anybody interestin’ I’m not at home.”
Lord Peter’s library was one of the most delightful bachelor rooms in London. Its scheme was black and primrose; its walls were lined with rare editions, and its chairs and Chesterfield sofa suggested the embraces of the houris. In one corner stood a black baby grand, a wood fire leaped on a wide old-fashioned hearth, and the Sèvres vases on the chimneypiece were filled with ruddy and gold chrysanthemums. To the eyes of the young man who was ushered in from the raw November fog it seemed not only rare and unattainable, but friendly and familiar, like a colourful and gilded paradise in a mediaeval painting.
Lord Peter jumped up with genuine eagerness.
“My dear man, I’m delighted to see you. What a beastly foggy night, ain’t it? Bunter, some more of that admirable coffee and another glass and the cigars. Parker, I hope you’re full of crime—nothing less than arson or murder will do for us tonight. ‘On such a night as this—’ Bunter and I were just sitting down to carouse. I’ve got a Dante, and a Caxton folio that is practically unique, at Sir Ralph Brocklebury’s sale. Bunter, who did the bargaining, is going to have a lens which does all kinds of wonderful things with its eyes shut, and
We both have got a body in a bath, We both have got a body in a bath— For in spite of all temptations To go in for cheap sensations We insist upon a body in a bath—
Nothing less will do for us, Parker. It’s mine at present, but we’re going shares in it. Property of the firm. Won’t you join us? You really must put _something_ in the jack-pot. Perhaps you have a body. Oh, do have a body. Every body welcome.
