Page:Bailey - Call Mr Fortune (Dutton, 1921).djvu/240

Rh the kind, but never quite of so pure a style. Upon my soul. Fortune, it has a sort of grandeur—the intensity of purpose, the contempt for ordinary values, the absolute uselessness of it. And it was damned clever."

Reggie chose a cigar. "Great work," he sighed. "All the marks of the real great man, if it wasn't diabolical. He was a great man, but for the hate in him. Just like the devil."

"You're so moral," Lomas protested. "Don't you feel the beauty of it?"

"Of course I'm moral. I'm sane. Oh, so sane, Lomas, old thing. That's why I beat the wily criminal. And the devil, God help him."

"Yes, you're as sane as a boy," Lomas nodded.

But all that was afterwards.

Everything that was done in the case is not (though you may have feared so) written here. We take it in the critical, significant scenes, and the next of them arrived some days after the discovery of the corpse.

Lomas was in his room with Superintendent Bell, when Kimball came to them. He was brisker than ever. "Anything new, is there? Have you hit on anything? I came round at once, you see, when I got your note. Delighted to get it. Much better to have all the details cleared up. Well, what is it?"

"I'm afraid I've nothing for you myself," said Lomas. "The fact is, Fortune thought you might