“Frightful,” agreed Chloe, blank but game. “But it all depends on how you look at it, doesn’t it?”
Campion felt it time to be helpful.
“I remember that burglary,” he remarked. “That was the Question Mark’s last escapade, wasn’t it? The newspapers call him the Crooked Crook.”
“That’s the man.” The suave Mr. Florian was almost excited. “The police can’t put their hands on him, and I understand they think he’s responsible for at least half a dozen London burglaries. I’m particularly interested in him because he has a mania for fine silver. He must be quite a connoisseur in his way. I can’t bring myself to believe he has that beautiful stuff melted down. It must go abroad.”
Chloe smiled at the old man with ingratiating earnestness.
“This is wonderful,” she said. “I feel I’m learning trade secrets. I like his name too — the Question Mark. Sounds quite thrilling. I thought burglars were always most disappointing people in real life — flat ears and no foreheads, and starving wives and things. This man sounds positively entertaining. Why is he called the Question Mark and the Crooked Crook?”
“Because he walks with a stoop, my child,” explained Mr. Campion, coming to the rescue of Mr. Florian, who was showing signs of exhaustion. “He’s been seen once or twice, a thin bent figure lurking in dark passageways and on unlighted staircases. Frighten yourself to death with that vision, my poppet, and come along.”
“He’s a cripple? How devastating!” Miss Pleyell was thinking rapidly, and the unaccustomed exercise brought most becoming spots of color to her cheekbones. “Tell me, how does he get up drain pipes and do all the energetic things burglars do do?”
Florian smiled, and Campion saw with relief that he had evidently decided to get into line with the rest of Chloe’s acquaintances and consider her an adorable half-wit.
“Ah, but he’s not a real crookback,” he said, lowering his voice as though he were speaking to a child. “He was nearly captured on one occasion. A servant girl caught sight of him from an upper window and gave the alarm. He took to his heels, and the woman told the police that he straightened up as he ran.”
“How very peculiar,” commented Chloe unexpectedly.
“Not really.” Florian’s tone was still gently humorous. “Most crooks have their little foibles, their little trade-marks. It’s a tradition. There’s one man who always cuts a heart-shaped hole in the pane of a downstairs window, and lifts the piece out carefully with a small rubber sucker so that he can get to the latch. There’s another who disguises himself as a milkman before he cracks a crib. The Question Mark probably looks normal in private life, but the police hunted for a long time for someone with a pronounced stoop.”
“Really?” said Chloe, her breathlessness a little overdone.
“Oh yes. Dear me, yes. Crooks are extraordinary people. Ask Mr. Campion. He’s the expert. Why, I remember when I was a young man first in business there was a thief who had our whole trade by the ears. We dreaded him. And he used to do his work in a Guardsman’s uniform, red tunic, mustachios, a swagger cane and all.”
Campion looked up with interest.
“That’s a prize effort,” he said, laughing. “I’ve never heard of him.”
Florian shook his head.
“Ah well, it’s thirty-five years ago at least. But he existed, believe me. We were all very much relieved when he was caught and jailed. I don’t know what happened to him when he was released. Some of your older friends at Scotland Yard might remember him. They called him The Shiner. Dear me, that comes back to me after all these years. Yes, well, Miss Pleyell, you don’t want to hear any more of my reminiscences, I’m sure. I’ll have the epergne dispatched to you immediately.”
Mr. Campion carried Miss Pleyell away.
“It’s sweet of you,” she said, thoughtfully eying him across the little table in the crowded but fashionable lounge where she had elected to take tea. “I shall treasure Rover always.”
“But not next to your heart,” murmured her host absently. His thoughts had wandered to a curious little notion which had come to him during the silversmith’s lecture on the crooks of the past. It was an odd little idea, and presently he put it out of his mind as ridiculous.
He grinned at the girl.
“I hope you didn’t let old Florian bore you?” he said.
“Bore me? My dear, you know I’m never bored.” Chloe’s eyes were gently reproachful. “Besides, the funny little creature was quite amusing. As it happens, I’m frightfully interested in crime just now.”
“Oh?” Mr. Campion’s eyebrows rose apprehensively.
Chloe’s smile was candid and confiding.
“Albert, my pet,” she said, “I want your advice. I don’t know if I’ve been frightfully clever or terribly childish.”
Her host resisted the impulse to cover his face with his hand.
“Criminal?” he enquired casually.
“Oh, no!” Chloe was amused. “Quite the reverse. I’m just employing a detective, that’s all. It’s really to oblige Gracie. Have you seen Gracie, my maid? She’s a girl with little black eyes. She has Bulgarian blood, or something. She sews exquisitely. I couldn’t lose her. She’s invaluable.”
Her escort blinked.
“Perhaps I’m not quite right in the head,” he remarked affably. “I don’t get the hang of this at all. Is the detective keeping an eye on Gracie to see she doesn’t wander off into the blue?”
“No, dearest.” Chloe was patient. “The detective is engaged to Gracie — for the time being. It won’t last. It never does. She’s so temperamental. It’s her Bulgarian blood. I’m simply giving him a job so she won’t marry him and start a shop or something frightful. You don’t follow me, do you? I’ll explain it all most carefully because I’d like your advice. I think I’ve been rather bright.”
The tall young man in the horn-rimmed spectacles sighed.
“Put the worst in words of one syllable,” he invited.
Chloe leaned forward, her expression childlike and deadly serious.
“First of all you must realize about Gracie,” she said earnestly. “If I were cynical I should say that Gracie was the most important person in my life. Without Gracie, my hair, my style, my clothes, my entire personality would simply go to pieces. Do you understand now?”
Mr. Campion thought she looked very charming and he said so. Chloe looked almost worried.
“Yes, well, there you are,” she said. “I’m not a fool. I give Gracie full credit for everything. I’m simply hopeless alone and I know it. I simply can’t afford to lose her. Unfortunately she’s frightfully susceptible. It’s her middle-European blood. It’s always coming out. She’s had nine serious love affairs in the past two years. Of course I always give her frightfully good advice, and I beg her to hang on until it wears off. So far it always has, although there was a young taxi driver last summer who gave me heart failure for months.”
“Dear me,” said Mr. Campion mildly. “And now it’s a detective?”
“Ah yes. But he wasn’t a detective to begin with,” explained Miss Pleyell, and went on airily: “He was out of work, you see, and Gracie was passionately sorry for him. She gets all worked up on these occasions, urgently maternal and all that.”
“Her Bulgarian blood, no doubt,” put in Mr. Campion soberly.