It’s that lazy scoundrel, Lofting,” snapped Harvey. “He can’t get assistants, he says”

HAngry

awke and Tommy passed out of his view, and shortly afterwards they were admitted to The Croft by Fay Harvey.

Except that she looked rather pale, there was little to suggest that she was ill, or recovering from a long illness.

“I’m so glad you’ve come,” she said. “I hope you’ll be able to get along with uncle.” She added quickly: “He’s been extremely angry since I told him I’d consulted you.”

Tommy dug Hawke in the ribs as Hawke made no response to this and they were taken quickly into a large lounge, overcrowded with furniture.

By a bureau was a man who looked nearer seventy than sixty, Hawke imagined, white-haired, thin-faced, and disagreeable of countenance.

Sitting somewhat nervously on a nearby chair was a little, meek-looking woman dressed in black, and with a high net collar, a relic of Victorian days. “Uncle, this is – ” began Fay.

“Who do you think I imagine it is?” growled Septimus Harvey in a harsh voice. “The King of Siam? Lot of nonsense bringing an amateur detective here.

“Tells you he won’t want paying unless he recovers your goods, does he? Don’t believe it! He’ll do nothing and then send in a huge account.”

He glared at Hawke, while his wife, the woman in black, made an ineffectual protest.

“Do be patient, Septimus.”

Hawke smiled, but Tommy felt like snapping out an angry retort.

“Believe it or not, Mr Harvey, if I don’t find your niece’s lost property I won’t expect payment,” Hawke assured the angry old man.

“Well, what are you wasting your time for, then?” growled Harvey. “If the police can’t find it, it’s a sure thing you can’t. What do you think the police are for?”

“I’ve a considerable respect for them,” Hawke assured him, “but they do miss important points sometimes.”

“And you come along and smell them out, do you?” sneered Septimus Harvey.

Tommy’s lips tightened, but Hawke remained good-humoured.

At last Harvey apparently thought a little better of his attitude, and gave grudging permission for Hawke to examine his niece’s room.

He insisted on accompanying Hawke, Tommy and Fay.

The open door of a room opposite the lounge showed that the decorators were busy – the room was empty of furniture which explained the crowded lounge, and there were dust sheets covering the floor.

As they reached the landing, the slap-slap-slap of a whitewash brush being wielded met their ears.

It stopped as they opened the door of the girl’s room, and Hawke, glancing over his shoulder, saw the alert red face of the workman peering round the door, a cigarette in one hand and his brush in the other.

Harvey turned on his heel sharply.

“Get on with your work, Lofting! Do you think I want the house turned upside down all the time?”

Lofting’s face disappeared promptly, and the slap-slap-slap began again, reluctantly.

Somewhat to his surprise, Hawke found the girl’s room a charmingly furnished one and newly decorated.

A walnut wardrobe by one wall, facing the bed, had held the portfolio which had been stolen.

The wardrobe had been locked, but Fay admitted the key had been left on her dressing-table.

“Criminal carelessness – deserve to lose your things,” snapped Harvey. “Well, Mister Hawke?” He sneered out the word “mister.”

“Do you expect to solve the problem by just looking round the room?”

Nonsense

Hawke, as usual, ignored him and proceeded to examine the window.

There were marks on the new paint of the sill, apparently caused by the heel of a boot or a shoe, and the paint on the window-frame was also scratched.

“I’d only been back in this room two days,” Fay explained, “I’d been sleeping in the spare room.”

“Isn’t the decorating taking rather a long time?” asked Hawke.

“It’s that lazy scoundrel, Lofting,” snapped Harvey. “He can’t get assistants, he says, and drags the work out himself.”

“Tell me,” said Hawke, “what room was being decorated when the robbery took place?”

“The one Lofting’s in now,” said Harvey. “But what’s that got to do with it?”

“If the window had been left open to let the paper or paint dry,” smiled Hawke.

“Don’t talk nonsense! The thief came through Fay’s window! The marks are there even for you to see.”

Hawke appeared to accept that rebuff, much to Tommy’s annoyance, and then led the way into the room where Lofting was working.

The decorator now slapped away with great vigour, and splashings of distemper – he was doing the ceiling – streaked towards the party by the door. “Stop that a minute!” snapped Harvey.

“Oh, orl right, orl right,” grunted Lofting. “First I got to stop, then I got to go on, then I got to stop again – why don’t you make up your mind?” “Don’t be impertinent!” Harvey shouted. “Okay, okay. I’ll leave the job. I’ve got plenty more to do,” retorted Lofting. “And you won’t get no one else to finish it, see?”

He glared, but could not prevent his red face from looking comical. Standing on the top of his ladder, he glowered down, while Hawke looked about the room.

“Isn’t it unusual to paper the walls and then distemper the ceiling?” he inquired.

Disgraceful

“’Course it is,” said Lofting promptly. “Mr Harvey there, he told me what colour to distemper the ceiling, then when the paper was up, he ses he wants a different colour.”

“It was wrong in the first place, and you know it!” snapped Harvey.

“You’ll do your work according to specification or I won’t accept it. And – and look! Look at that!”

The old man went red in the face. “I’ve never seen such disgraceful work – outrageous!” He continued shouting: “Look at the blisters in that wallpaper! Just look at them!”

Lofting came hurriedly down from his ladder, shouting: “Leave that paper alone! Think I don’t know my job? Leave it alone, I tell you!”

As he rushed across the room, his foot kicked against a bucket of distemper.

It was a deep cream, and it shot across the room, splashing Harvey’s trousers, Fay’s shoes, and Tommy’s coat.

Hawke just managed to dodge aside, but a shower of the distemper landed on the wall where Harvey had been criticising the bulging paper. More tomorrow.

Two collections of Dixon Hawke stories are available from www.dcthomsonshop.co.uk or freephone 0800 318 846.