“Sorry, Father,” she said. “I wanted to catch MacDonald. Were you speaking?”
“As a matter of fact I was,” said Lord Caterham. “But it doesn’t matter. What were you saying to MacDonald?”
“Trying to cure him of thinking he’s God Almighty. But that’s an impossible task. I expect the Cootes have been bad for him. MacDonald wouldn’t care one hoot, or even two hoots, for the largest steamroller that ever was. What’s Lady Coote like?”
Lord Caterham considered the question.
“Very like my idea of Mrs. Siddons,” he said at last. “I should think she went in a lot for amateur theatricals. I gather she was very upset about the clock business.”
“What clock business?”
“Tredwell has just been telling me. It seems the house-party had some joke on. They bought a lot of alarm clocks and hid them about this young Wade’s room. And then, of course, the poor chap was dead. Which made the whole thing rather beastly.”
Bundle nodded.
“Tredwell told me something else rather odd about the clocks,” continued Lord Caterham, who was now quite enjoying himself. “It seems that somebody collected them all and put them in a row on the mantelpiece after the poor fellow was dead.”
“Well, why not?” said Bundle.
“I don’t see why not myself,” said Lord Caterham. “But apparently there was some fuss about it. No one would own up to having done it, you see.