‘Aw, be funny!’

‘Fact. I assure you.’

‘Mr Alleyn’s thinking of the lady with the picture,’ said a youth.

‘What—her? With her face all mussed in green paint. Mr Alleyn’s not screwy yet, is he? Gee, I’ll say a woman’s got no self-respect to go around that way in public. Did you get a look at that smock? And the picture! Well, I had to be polite and say it was cute, but it’s nobody’s big sorrow she didn’t finish it. The wharf at Suva! Seems I struck it lucky, but what it’s meant for’s just anyone’s guess. C’m on, Mr Strong-Silent Sleuth, put me out of my agony and say she don’t mean one thing to you.’

‘Miss Van Maes,’ said Alleyn, ‘do you know that you make me feel very middle-aged and inexpressibly foolish? I haven’t got the smallest idea what the right answer is to any single one of your questions.’

‘Maybe I could teach you. Maybe I could teach you a whole lot of fun, honey.’

‘You’re very kind, but, do you know, I’m afraid I’m past the receptive age.’

She widened her enormous eyes. The mascaraed lashes stuck out round them like black toothpicks. Her ash-fair hair was swept back from her very lovely face into a cluster of disciplined and shining curls. She had the un-human good looks of a film star. Undoubtedly she was rather tight.

‘Well,’ she said, ‘my bet with the boys is still good. Twenty-five’ll get anybody fifty you kiss me before we hit Honolulu. And I don’t mean maybe.’

‘I should be very much honoured—’

‘Yeah? And I don’t mean the get-by-the-censor stuff, either. No, sir!’

She stared at him, and upon her normally blank and beautiful face there dawned a look of doubt.

‘Say,’ she said, ‘you’re not going to tell me you got a yen for that woman?’

‘I don’t know what a yen is,’ Alleyn said, ‘but I’ve got nothing at all for Miss Troy, and I can assure you she has got even less than that for me.’

CHAPTER 2
Five Letters

From Miss Agatha Troy to her friend, Miss Katti Bostock, the well-known painter of plumbers, miners and Negro musicians:

S. S. Niagara, August 1st.