“You really are positively marvellous at makeup,” I said generously. “All the time you were Miss Pettigrew I never recognized you⁠—even when you broke your pencil in the shock of seeing me climb upon the train at Cape Town.”

He tapped upon the desk with the pencil he was holding in his hand at the minute.

“All this is very well in its way, but we must get to business. Perhaps, Miss Beddingfeld, you can guess why we required your presence here?”

“You will excuse me,” I said, “but I never do business with anyone but principals.”

I had read the phrase or something like it in a moneylender’s circular, and I was rather pleased with it. It certainly had a devastating effect upon Mr. Chichester-Pettigrew. He opened his mouth and then shut it again. I beamed upon him.