“Who?” demanded Parker, disregarding the grammatical nicety.

“Why, from Pamela Dean, to be sure. I recognize your description of the envelope.”

“Pamela Dean? The victim’s sister?”

“As you say.”

“Willis’s young woman?”

“Precisely.”

“But how should he know about the letter?”

“I don’t suppose he did. I rather fancy this is the result of a little bit of self-advertisement I put in yesterday afternoon at the office tea-party. I made it clear to all and sundry that I had been experimenting on the roof with a catapult.”

“Did you? Who, exactly, were the all and sundry?”

“The twenty people taking tea and all the other people they mentioned it to.”

“Rather a wide limit.”

“M’m, yes. I thought I might get some reaction. What a pity it reacted on you and not on me.”

“A very great pity,” agreed Mr. Parker, with feeling.

“Still, it might have been worse. We’ve got three lines to go upon. The people who heard about the catapult. The people who knew, or inquired for, my address. And, of course, the bloke who’s lost his pencil. But, I say-” Wimsey broke off with a shout of laughter-“what a shock it must have been for whoever it was when I turned up this morning without so much as a black eye! Why in the name of creation didn’t you let me have all the details first thing this morning, so that I could have kept a look-out?”

“We were otherwise employed,” said Lady Mary.

“Besides, we didn’t think it had anything to do with you.”

“You should have guessed. Wherever trouble turns up, there am I at the bottom of it. But I’ll overlook it this time. You have been sufficiently punched, and no one shall say that a Wimsey could not be magnanimous. But this blighter-you didn’t manage to mark him, Charles, did you?”

“Afraid not. I got a clutch on his beastly throat, but he was all muffled up.”

“You did that badly, Charles. You should have socked him one. But, as I said before, I forgive you. I wonder if our friend will have another shot at me.”

“Not at this address, I hope,” said Mary.

“I hope not. I’d like to have him under my own eye next time. He must have been pretty smart to get that letter. Why in the world-ah! now I understand.”

“What?”

“Why nobody fainted at the sight of me this morning. He must have had a torch with him. He knocks you down and turns on the torch to see if you’re probably dead. The first thing he spots is the letter. He grabs that-why? Because-we’ll come back to that. He grabs it and then looks at your classic features. He realized that he’s slugged the wrong man, and at that very moment he hears Mary making a hullabaloo. So he clears. That’s perfectly plain now. But the letter? Would he have taken any letter that happened to be there, or did he know the writing? When was that letter delivered? Yes, of course, the 9.30 post. Suppose, when he came in to look for my flat, he saw the letter in the box and recognized whom it was from. That opens up a wide field of speculation, and possibly even offers us another motive.”

“Peter,” said Lady Mary, “I don’t think you ought to sit here exciting Charles with all this speculation. It’ll send his temperature up.”

“So, it will, by Jove! Well, look here, old boy, I’m really fearfully sorry you copped that packet that was meant for me. It’s perfectly damnable luck and I’m dashed thankful it was no worse. I’ll buzz off now. I’ve got to, anyhow. I’ve got a date. So-long.”

Wimsey’s first action after leaving the flat was to ring up Pamela Dean, whom he fortunately found at home. He explained that her letter had been lost in transmission, and asked what was in it.

“Only a note from Dian de Momerie. She wants to know who you are. You seem to have made a remarkable hit.”

“We aim to please,” said Peter. “What have you done about it?”

“Nothing. I didn’t know what you would like me to do.”

“You didn’t give her my address?”

“No. That was what she was asking for. I didn’t want to make another mistake, so I passed it all on to you.”

“Quite right.”

“Well?”

“Tell her-does she know that I’m at Pym’s?”

“No, I was very careful to say absolutely nothing about you. Except your name. I did tell her that, but she seems to have forgotten it.”

“Good. Listen, now. Tell bright Dian that I’m a most mysterious person. You never know where to find me yourself. Hint that I’m probably miles away-in Paris or Vienna, or anything that sounds fruity. You can convey the right impression, I know. Phillips Oppenheim, with a touch of Ethel M. Dell and Elinor Glynn.”

“Oh, yes, I can do that.”

“And you might say that she will probably see me some time when she least expects it. Suggest, if you don’t mind being so vulgar, that I am a sort of yellow-dog dingo, very truly run after and hard to catch. Be stimulating. Be intriguing.”

“I will. Am I at all jealous, by the way?”

“Yes, if you like. Give the impression that you’re sort of putting her off. It’s a hard chase and you’re not keen on competitors.”

“All right. That won’t be difficult.”

“What did you say?”

“Nothing. I said I could manage that all right.”

“I know you’ll do it beautifully. I rely on you very much.”

“Thank you. How is the enquiry getting on?”

“So-so.”

“Tell me all about it some time, won’t you?”

“Rather! As soon as there’s anything to report.”

“Will you come to tea one Saturday or Sunday?”

“I should love to.”

“I’ll keep you to that.”

“Oh, yes, rather! Well, goodnight.”

“Goodnight-Yellow-dog Dingo.”

“Bung-ho!”

Wimsey put down the receiver. “I hope,” he thought, “she isn’t going to make an awkwardness. You cannot trust these young women. No fixity of purpose. Except, of course, when you particularly want them to be yielding.”

He grinned with a wry mouth, and went out to keep his date with the one young woman who showed no signs of yielding to him, and what he said or did on that occasion is in no way related to this story.

Ginger Joe hoisted himself cautiously up in bed and looked round the room.

His elder brother-not the policeman, but sixteen-year-old Bert, the nosey one-was reassuringly asleep, curled up dog-fashion, and dreaming, no doubt, of motor-cycles. The faint light from the street lamp outlined the passive hump he made in the bedclothes, and threw a wan gleam across Ginger’s narrow bedstead.

From beneath his pillow, Ginger drew out a penny exercise book and a stubby pencil. There was very little privacy in Ginger’s life, and opportunities had to be seized when they occurred. He licked the pencil, opened the book and headed a page in a large, round hand: “Report.”

There he paused. It was desirable to do this thing really creditably, and the exercises in English composition they had given him at school did not seem to help. “My Favourite Book,”

“What I Should Like to Do when I Grow Up,”

“What I Saw at the Zoo”-very good subjects but not of great assistance to a rising young detective. He had once been privileged to take a glimpse at Wally’s note-book (Wally being the policeman), and remembered that the items had all begun somewhat in this fashion: “At 8:30 p.m., as I was proceeding along Wellington Street ”-a good opening, but not applicable to the present case. The style of Sexton Blake, also, though vigorous, was more suited for the narration of stirring adventures than for the compilation of a catalogue of names and facts. And on the top of all this, there was the awkward question of spelling-always a stumbling-block. Ginger felt vaguely that an ill-spelt report would have an untrustworthy appearance.

In this emergency, he consulted his native commonsense, and found it a good guide.