Page:The Secret of Chimneys - 1987.djvu/29

 George Lomax, inclined to embonpoint, with a red face and protuberant eyes, and an immense sense of his own importance.

“You see the point, Caterham? We can’t—we simply can’t afford a scandal of any kind just now. The position is one of the utmost delicacy.”

“It always is,” said Lord Caterham, with a flavour of irony.

“My dear fellow, I’m in a position to know!”

“Oh, quite so, quite so,” said Lord Caterham, falling back upon his previous line of defence.

“One slip over this Herzoslovakian business and we’re done. It is most important that the Oil concessions should be granted to a British company. You must see that?”

“Of course, of course.”

“Prince Michael Obolovitch arrives the end of the week, and the whole thing can be carried through at Chimneys under the guise of a shooting party.”

“I was thinking of going abroad this week,” said Lord Caterham.

“Nonsense, my dear Caterham, no one goes abroad in early October.”

“My doctor seems to think I’m in rather a bad way,” said Lord Caterham, eyeing a taxi that was crawling past with longing eyes.

He was quite unable to make a dash for liberty, however, since Lomax had the unpleasant habit of retaining a hold upon a person with whom he was engaged in serious conversation—doubtless the result of long experience. In this case, he had a firm grip of the lapel of Lord Caterham’s coat.

“My dear man, I put it to you imperially. In a moment of national crisis, such as is fast approaching”

Lord Caterham wriggled uneasily. He felt suddenly that he would rather give any number of house parties than listen to George Lomax quoting from one of his own speeches. He knew by experience that Lomax was quite capable of going on for twenty minutes without a stop.

“All right,” he said hastily, “I’ll do it. You’ll arrange the whole thing, I suppose.”

“My dear fellow, there’s nothing to arrange. Chimneys, quite apart from its historic associations, is ideally situated. I shall be at the Abbey, less than seven miles away. It wouldn’t