Читать книгу A King by Night - Edgar Wallace - Страница 34

"I am not very bad, but it was rather a shock," said Dr. Eversham with a smile. "At my age, one isn't fitted for violent exercise of this kind."

He was lying in bed, his head propped up on pillows, and in the clearer light of day Selby was able to see the extent of the damage.

"It is a warning to me not to go to dancing clubs," said Eversham ruefully. "If I had gone home early, like a respectable member of society, this would not have happened."

"Have you any idea why you were marked down for attack?"

"No," said the other, "I haven't the least notion as to why this happened. I have neither publicly nor privately condemned the Terror, though of course I hold him in as great abhorrence as any other citizen. I can only imagine that in some way my association—" he hesitated.

"With me?" suggested Selby.

"Well, hardly with you, with Miss Guildford. That may explain why I have incurred the brute's displeasure. At any rate, I am not very ill and I wish you would assure Miss Guildford on that point. I hope to be able to come round and see her to-morrow night."

Selby went home to find the weary Bill Joyner nodding in his chair. He sent him off to bed, and, putting out the light and pulling up the blinds, he took off his coat and subjected it to a minute examination. What he saw evidently satisfied him. Resuming the coat, he sat down, and, with his pipe between his teeth and a heavy frown on his face, gave himself over to his thoughts. Mrs. Jennings, coming in to tidy the room, found him sitting, wakeful and alert, and gasped her concern.

"Yes, I've been up all night, but I've been resting," said Selby with a smile. "Will you get me some tea, and my bath? I'll shave and go out."

"But, Mr. Lowe," said the shocked lady, "wouldn't it be much better if you had a little sleep?"

"It would be much worse. I don't want a little sleep, I want nearly twenty-four hours," said Selby. "In fact, Mrs. Jennings," he added with a whimsical smile, "I am keeping awake in order that I shall not sleep too long!"

After tea came, he went upstairs to change, and an hour later was pressing the bell of an all-night garage in Tottenham Court Road.

"My flivver, John, quick," he said to the sleepy man who answered his summons.

"The little one or the big one, sir?"

"The little one will do."

The attendant pushed out a small two-seater, heaved a couple of tins of spirit on board as the machine was moving, and watched the rapidly disappearing figure with admiration and not a little awe. At eleven o'clock the little car came into the garage again, white with dust. As he brushed Selby's dusty coat, the attendant suggested that the journey had been a long one.

"Yes and no," said Selby. "By the way, do you know much about the roads?"

"The roads?" said the man in surprise. "Yes, I know a lot about the roads: I drive a great deal."

"Have you heard of any new experimental top dressing? I understand some of the municipal authorities are trying a new surface on the roads?"

"They're trying white tar down at Fenton," said the man without hesitation, "but it's no good: they can't get it to set, and it serves the machines cruel. Why, it took me two hours to clean a flivver belonging to one of our customers that had passed over that patch."

"Where else is this new dressing being tried?"

"Nowhere else, sir. There was a note in the Auto last week from somebody who wrote condemning this new idea."

"You are sure it is being tried nowhere else?"

"I'm perfectly certain. You can make sure of that in the Motor Union Bulletin."

"Thank you, I saw it before I went out," said Selby Lowe.

He slipped a coin into the man's hand and walked home. Bill and the girl were at breakfast when he arrived.

"What happened to the doctor last night?" was Gwendda's first question.

"I told Bill at four o'clock this morning," said Selby patiently. "Mr. Juma of Bonginda, who is certainly attending to business with great thoroughness, attacked him as he was letting himself into his house."

Gwendda's face was grave.

"I never felt frightened before," she said, "but I have half a mind to go back to America."

"You'll do nothing of the sort," said Selby coolly, seating himself at the table. "And please don't get mad at me, because I'm standing in loco parentis. If the beast wants to make an end of you, what better place is there than a ship? Flick!"—he snapped his fingers—"and you're dead and overboard! Forgive me for introducing so gruesome a possibility—and, Bill, you have wolfed the sausages as usual. I will not be so ungallant as to suggest that Miss Guildford assisted you in the raid."

"Where have you been, Selby?" asked Bill lazily.

His interest was so obviously insincere that Selby Lowe laughed softly.

"I've become a road inspector," he said. "It is a fine life!"

Soon after, he left the table, and as he did not come back, Bill thought he had gone out again. Happening to look into Selby's room before leaving for his office, he found him in bed and sleeping peacefully.

He was still sleeping when dinner was served, and when, after the meal was over, Bill went up to ask his friend if he should have some food put aside for him, the bed was empty. Selby had left the house.