FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127  
128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   >>   >|  
do a bit of thinking." "Maybe you're right, Jimmy," said I as we lit our cigarettes. "And if so, it's pretty ghastly. . . . He's had enough to put him off his hinge. But somehow I can't bring myself--No, hang it! I've always looked on Jack as the sanest man I've ever known. If he has a failing it's for working everything out by cold reason." "Just what he's doing at this moment," answered Jimmy dryly. "If you don't like the word 'mad' I'll take it back and substitute 'balmy,' or anything you like. Madness is a relative term; and I should have thought that what you call working-everything-out-by-cold-reason was a form of it. I know jolly well that if I felt myself taken that way I should go to a doctor about it. And if _you're_ going to practise it on the subject just now before the committee, I shall leave the chair and this meeting breaks up in disorder." "The point is," said I, "that the letter has gone." "What address?" he asked pouring out the coffee. "Biarritz, Grand Hotel--Why surely you read it?"--I stared at him, but he was looking down on the cups. Then of a sudden I understood. "Jimmy," I said humbly, "I've been an ass." "Ah," said he, "I'm glad you see it in that light. . . . The afternoon mail has gone: but there's the night boat. You can't telegraph, unfortunately. In his state of mind you mustn't warn him. You must catch him sitting." "Look here," I proposed. "It will be a nuisance for you, Jimmy--it will probably bore you stiff. But if you'll only come along with me . . ." "The implied compliment is noted and accepted," said Jimmy gravely. "The invitation must be declined, with thanks, though. Your mind is working better already. A few hours holiday off the L.C.C., and you'll find yourself the man you were. But the gear wants oiling. . . . Do you remember your betting me ten to one this morning, in a lucid interval, that Farrell would break for home? Well, I didn't take you up. I don't mind owning that, after you'd left, and after some thought, I told Jephson to pack _both_ suit-cases. But that lawyer, with his infernal notion of dispatch in business, will have put money in the Professor's pocket some hours before you reach Biarritz. Money's his means of pursuit: and it's well on the cards that you'll find both your birds flown. You are going to Biarritz, Otty, for your sins--like Napoleon III. and other eminent persons before you: and you'll have, unlike the histo
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127  
128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
working
 

Biarritz

 

reason

 
thought
 

holiday

 

implied

 

proposed

 

thinking

 

nuisance

 

sitting


accepted

 
gravely
 

invitation

 
declined
 
compliment
 

oiling

 

pursuit

 

pocket

 

Professor

 

notion


dispatch

 

business

 

eminent

 

persons

 

unlike

 
Napoleon
 

infernal

 

lawyer

 

interval

 

Farrell


morning

 

remember

 
betting
 

Jephson

 

owning

 

relative

 

cigarettes

 

Madness

 

substitute

 

doctor


practise
 
subject
 

sanest

 

looked

 

failing

 
answered
 

pretty

 
moment
 
ghastly
 

humbly