Smallbone Deceased

“Vocation, my foot,” said Bob. “Look here, I’ve never told this to anyone in my life, but you might as well know exactly where you stand. I hate the law. I loathe and detest all this pettifogging round with words and figures, and hours and days and weeks spent mangling bumph and sitting on my bottom worrying about whether Lady Marshmoreton’s annuity should be retained in Consolidated Mines or shifted to 3½ per cent Non-Cumulative Preferential Fish Paste, and whether Lord Haltwhistle has got the power to appoint an eighth part of the fifteenth part of the funds in his great-aunt’s will trust to his nephews and nieces in equal shares, and if not why not.”

Bohun grinned. For the first time since his arrival in the office he remembered Bob as he had last seen him at school, with a serious inky face, broken glasses, and a pair of black boots two sizes too large for him.

“I think maybe you’ve got something there,” he said, “but what do you want to do?”

“Sailing,” said Bob, “and farming. I know of just the place in Cornwall where you could run a small stock farm with one cowman, and there’s a creek runs up actually through the farm. It’s deep enough for a small sea-boat. It would only cost six thousand, and perhaps another three or four thousand to stock it. I’d have to have a reserve, because I don’t suppose I should make it pay at first.”

“I see,” said Bohun. “And how much did you—how much were you expecting to get for your share in the equity of the firm?”

“Twenty thousand,” said Bob. “And it ought to bring in an absolutely safe four thousand a year.”

There was a short silence. Bob Horniman thought of a meadow, knee-deep in the first pasture of early summer; of a silver river running through the meadow; of the murmur of flies; of mighty udders, rhythmically a-swing. Bohun thought of the Duchess of Southend’s Marriage Settlement.

“I’ll see my father at lunch-time,” he said. “Where money’s the question he usually makes his mind up quickly. I’ll probably be able to give you an answer by tomorrow evening.”

IV

Mr. Bohun (senior) had for his offices the third floor of one of the noble buildings on the east side of Lombard Street.

His offices were almost spartan in the simplicity of their arrangements. On the right, as you came out of the elevator, a door invited your enquiries. On the left was a similar door, without anything on it at all. Henry opened this door and went into an anteroom, in which sat an old-looking young man, who earned a four-figure salary by insulating Mr. Bohun from the outside world. He looked up as Henry came in, nodded, and returned to the study of an elaborate graph which he was plotting in six different coloured inks.

Mr. Bohun, who was sitting in a leather arm-chair beside an open fire (the only one allowed in the building), got up, said “Hullo, Henry” in an absent-minded sort of way, and sat down again. He didn’t click switches or talk into boxes and tell people he wasn’t to be disturbed, because there were no switches or boxes in the room, which looked like a smoking-room or study. Anyway, the young man outside would see to all that.

“Hullo, Dad,” said Henry. “You aren’t getting any thinner.”

“No exercise,” said Mr. Bohun. “No excitement. In this firm we don’t go in for excitement. Not like you lawyers. We keep papers in our deed boxes. By the way, I see you’ve been having more trouble lately.”

“Yes,” said Henry. “That’s really one of the things I wanted to tell you about. Here’s how it is…”

By the time he had finished, Mr. Bohun had allowed his pipe to go out. He showed no other definite sign of interest.

“What do you think about it yourself?” he said finally.

“I’d like to do it,” said Henry. “They’re not a very happy firm at the moment. You could hardly expect them to be. But I think they’re sound enough at heart. They’ve got a first-class connection and a lot of business. Perhaps they’ll lose some of it over this tamasha, but it’ll die down. People don’t change their solicitors very easily.”

“What about the price?”

Henry grinned. “I know quite well,” he said, “that you’ve got your own means of finding out anything you want to know in that line. You don’t need my opinion.”

“Perhaps not,” said his father, “but let’s have it.”

“I think,” said Henry slowly, “that it would be a fair gamble. They’re not gilt-edged. If they were you wouldn’t get four-tenths of the equity being offered for twenty thousand.”

“No,” said his father. “I don’t think you would. All right. I’ll have a look at it. One of the conditions, of course, will be that you stay in the firm. I shall be investing the money in you as much as in Horniman, Birley and What’s-it.”

“Very handsome of you,” said Henry. “I’m going to get myself some lunch. I suppose it’s no good asking you to come out.”

“Never have lunch,” said Mr. Bohun. “Waste of time. By the way, I suppose you haven’t got any idea who did these murders? Not,” he added hastily, “that I’m being inquisitive but it might make a difference to my offer.”