Читать книгу The 'Phone Booth Mystery онлайн

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In the hall he encountered Thomson, Sir Robert’s confidential man—a short, spare, reticent individual, who had grown grey in his master’s service.

“Won’t you have some coffee, sir, or a whisky-and-soda,” he asked, as he helped Roger into his coat.

“No, thanks. Good night, Thomson, and good-bye. I shan’t be back for some weeks, you know.”

“Good-bye, sir, and the best of good luck to you and the young lady.”

The last words were an astonishing concession, for Thomson seldom uttered an unnecessary syllable—not even to his master. Roger was surprised and touched.

“Good old Thomson!” he thought, as he hailed a passing taxi. “I suppose he actually approves of me after all, though I should never have guessed it! What a queer old stick he is.”

He was greeted uproariously by the small assemblage that awaited him at Austin Starr’s snug flat in Great Smith Street: Starr himself, a smart young American journalist, whom he had met when he was on service during the war, and with whom he had formed a friendship that seemed likely to prove permanent; George Winston, a Foreign Office clerk, who was to be his “best man” to-morrow; and some half-dozen others.