However, that was neither here nor there. He pulled down his waistcoat and became cold and business-like--the dry young lawyer.
"Er--how do you do, Miss Bennett?" he said with a question in his voice, raising his eyebrows in a professional way. He modelled this performance on that of lawyers he had seen on the stage, and wished he had some snuff to take or something to tap against his front teeth. "Miss Bennett, I believe?"
Billie drew herself up stiffly.
"Yes," she replied. "How clever of you to remember me."
"I have a good memory."
"How nice! So have I!"
There was a pause, during which Billie allowed her gaze to travel casually about the room. Sam occupied the intermission by staring furtively at her profile. He was by now in a thoroughly overwrought condition, and the thumping of his heart sounded to him as if workmen were mending the street outside. How beautiful she looked, with that red hair peeping out beneath her hat and ... However!
"Is there anything I can do for you?" he asked in the sort of voice Widgery might have used. Sam always pictured Widgery as a small man with bushy eyebrows, a thin face, and a voice like a rusty file.
"Well, I really wanted to see Sir Mallaby."
"My father has been called away on important business to Walton Heath. Cannot I act as his substitute?"
"Do you know anything about the law?"
"Do I know anything about the law!" echoed Sam, amazed. "Do I know--! Why, I was reading my Widgery on Nisi Prius Evidence when you came in."
"Oh, were you?" said Billie interested. "Do you always read on the floor."
"I told you I dropped my pen," said Sam coldly.
"And of course you couldn't read without that! Well, as a matter of fact, this has nothing to do with Nisi--what you said."
"I have not specialised exclusively on Nisi Prius Evidence. I know the law in all its branches."
"Then what would you do if a man insisted on playing the orchestrion when you wanted to get to sleep?"
"The orchestrion?"
"Yes."
"The orchestrion, eh? Ah! H'm!" said Sam.
"You still haven't made it quite clear," said Billie.
"I was thinking."
"Oh, if you want to think!"
"Tell me the facts," said Sam.
"Well, Mr. Mortimer and my father have taken a house together in the country, and for some reason or other they have quarrelled, and now Mr. Mortimer is doing everything he can to make father uncomfortable. Yesterday afternoon father wanted to sleep, and Mr. Mortimer started his orchestrion just to annoy him."