XXII

(Extract from the diary of Sir Eustace Pedler)

I am inclined to abandon my reminiscences. Instead I shall write a short article entitled “Secretaries I Have Had.” As regards secretaries, I seem to have fallen under a blight. At one minute I have no secretaries, at another I have too many. At the present minute I am journeying to Rhodesia with a pack of women. Race goes off with the two best-looking, of course, and leaves me with the dud. That is what always happens to me⁠—and, after all, this is my private car, not Race’s.

Also Anne Beddingfeld is accompanying me to Rhodesia on the pretext of being my temporary secretary. But all this afternoon she has been out on the observation platform with Race exclaiming at the beauty of the Hex River Pass. It is true that I told her her principal duty would be to hold my hand. But she isn’t even doing that. Perhaps she is afraid of Miss Pettigrew. I don’t blame her if so. There is nothing attractive about Miss Pettigrew⁠—she is a repellent female with large feet, more like a man than a woman.

There is something very mysterious about Anne Beddingfeld. She jumped on board the train at the last minute, puffing like a steam engine for all the world as though she’d been running a race⁠—and yet Pagett told me that he’d seen her off to Durban last night! Either Pagett has been drinking again or else the girl must have an astral body.