The Collected Short Stories of Roald Dahl Volume 2 Read online

  "We'll lave our lunch, pet, then we'll go to our room and take a little nap, right?"

  Miss Tottle displayed her sulphurous teeth and nodded her head.

  "And after that we'll do some letters."

  "Letters?" she cried. "I don't want to do letters! I thought this was going to be a holiday!"

  "It is a 'oliday, pet, but I don't like lettin' good business go to waste. The 'otel will lend you a typewriter. I already checked on that. And they're lendin' me their 'Oo's 'Oo. Every good 'otel in the world keeps an English 'Oo's 'Oo. The manager likes to know 'oo's important so lee can kiss their backsides."

  "They won't find you in it," Miss Tottle said, a bit huffy now.

  "No," Mr Buggage said. "I'll grant you that. But they won't find many in it that's got more money'n me neither. In this world, it's not 'oo you are, my girl. It's not even "oo you know. It's what you got that counts."

  "We've never done letters on holiday before," Miss Tottle said.

  "There's a first time for everything, pet."

  "How can we do letters without newspapers?"

  "You know very well English papers always go airmail to places like this. I bought a Times in the foyer when we arrived. It's actually the same as I was workin' on in the office yesterday so I done most of my 'omework already. I'm beginning to fancy a piece of that lobster over there. You ever seen bigger lobsters than that?"

  "But you're surely not going to post the letters from here, are you?" Miss Tottle said.

  "Certainly not. We'll leave 'em undated and date 'em and post 'em as soon as we return. That way we'll 'ave a nice backlog up our sleeves."

  Miss Tottle stared at the lobsters on the table across the pool, then at the people milling around, then she reached out and placed a hand on Mr Buggage's thigh, high up under the bathing-shorts. She began to stroke the hairy thigh. "Come on, Billy," she said, "why don't we take a break from the letters same as we always do when we're on hols?"

  "You surely don't want us throwing about a thousand quid away a day, do you?" Mr Buggage said. "And quarter of it yours, don't forget that."

  "We don't have the firm's notepaper and we can't use hotel paper, for God's sake."

  "I brought the notepaper," Mr Buggage said, triumphant. "I got a 'ole box of it. And envelopes."

  "Oh, all right," Miss Tottle said. "Are you going to fetch me some of that lobster, lover?"

  "We'll go together," Mr Buggage said, and he stood up and started waddling round the pool in those almost knee-length bathing-trunks he had bought a couple of years back in Honolulu. They had a pattern of green and yellow and white flowers on them. Miss Tottle got to her feet and followed him.

  Mr Buggage was busy helping himself at the buffet when he heard a man's voice behind him saying, "Fiona, I don't think you've met Mrs Smith-Swithin… and this is Lady Hedgecock,"

  "How d'you do"… "How d'you do," the voices said.

  Mr Buggage glanced round at the speakers. There was a man and a woman in swimmingclothes and two elderly ladies wearing cotton dresses. Those names, he thought. I've heard those names before, I know I have… SmithSwithin… Lady Hedgecock. He shrugged and continued to load food on to his plate.

  A few minutes later, he was sitting with Miss Tottle at a small table under a sun-umbrella and each of them was tucking into an immense half lobster. "Tell me, does the name Lady 'Edgecock mean anything to you?" Mr Buggage asked, talking with his mouth full.

  "Lady Hedgecock? She's one of our clients. Or she was. I never forget names like that. Why?"

  "And what about a Mrs Smith-Swithin? Does that also ring a bell?"

  "It does, actually," Miss Tottle said. "Both of them do. Why do you ask that suddenly?"

  "Because both of 'em's 'ere."

  "Good God! How d'you know?"

  "And what's more, my girl, they're together! They're chums!"

  "They're not!"

  "Oh, yes they are!"

  Mr Buggage told her how he knew. "There they are," he said, pointing with a fork whose prongs were yellow with mayonnaise. "Those two fat old broads talkin' to the tall man and the woman."

  Miss Tottle stared, fascinated. "You know," she said, "I've never actually seen a client of ours in the flesh before, not in all the years we've been in business."

  "Nor me," Mr Buggage said. "One thing's for sure. I picked 'em right, didn't I? They're rolling in it. That's obvious. And they're stupid. That's even more obvious."

  "Do you think it could be dangerous, Billy, the two of them knowing each other?"

  "It's a bloody queer coincidence," Mr Buggage said, "but I don't think it's dangerous. Neither of 'em's ever goin' to say a word. That's the beauty of it."

  "I guess you're right."

  "The only possible danger," Mr Buggage said, "would be if they saw my name on the register. I got a very unusual name just like theirs. It would ring bells at once."

  "Guests don't see the register," Miss Tottle said.

  "No, they don't," Mr Buggage said. "No one's ever goin' to bother us. They never 'as and they never will."

  "Amazing lobster," Miss Tottle said. "Lobster is sex food," Mr Buggage announced, eating more of it.

  "You're thinking of oysters, lover."

  "I am not thinking of oysters. Oysters is sex food, too, but lobsters is stronger. A dish of lobsters can drive some people crazy."

  "Like you, perhaps?" she said, wriggling her rump in the chair.

  "Maybe," Mr Buggage said. "We shall just 'ave to wait and see about that, won't we, pet?"

  "Yes," she said.

  "It's a good thing they're so expensive," Mr Buggage said. "If every Tom, Dick and 'Arry could afford to buy 'em, the We world would be full of sex maniacs."

  "Keep eating it," she said.

  After lunch, the two of them went upstairs to their suite, where they cavorted clumsily on the huge bed for a brief period. Then they took a nap.

  And now they were in their private sittingroom and were wearing only dressing-gowns over their nakedness, Mr Buggage in a plum-coloured silk one, Miss Tottle in pastel pink and pale green. Mr Buggage was reclining on the sofa with a copy of yesterday's Times on his lap and a Who's Who on the coffee table.

  Miss Tottle was at the writing-desk with a hotel typewriter before her and a notebook in her hand. Both were again drinking champagne.

  "This is a prime one," Mr Buggage was saying. "Sir Edward Leishman. Got the lead obit. Chairman of Aerodynamics Engineering. One of our major industrialists, it says."

  "Nice," Miss Tottle said. "Make sure the wife's alive."

  "Leaves a widow and three children," Mr Buggage read out. "And… wait a minute… in '00's 'Oo it says, Recreations, walkin' and fishin'. Clubs, White's and the Reform."

  "Address?" Miss Tottle asked.

  "The Red House, Andover, Wilts."

  "How d'you spell Leishman?" Miss Tottle asked. Mr Buggage spelled it.

  "How much shall we go for?"

  "A lot," Mr Buggage said. "He was loaded. Try around nine 'undred."

  "You want to slip in The Compleat Angler?

  It says he was a fisherman."

  "Yes. First edition. Four 'undred and twenty quid. You know the rest of it by 'eart. Bang it out quick. I got another good one to come."

  Miss Tottle put a sheet of notepaper into the typewriter and very rapidly she began to type. She had done so many thousands of these letters over the years that she never had to pause for one word. She even knew how to compile the list of books so that it came out to around nine hundred pounds or three hundred and fifty pounds or five hundred and twenty or whatever. She could make it come out to any sum Mr Buggage thought the client would stand. One of the secrets of this particular trade, as Mr Buggage knew, was never to be too greedy. Never go over a thousand quid with anyone, not even a famous millionaire.

  The letter, as miss Tottle typed it, went like this: WILLIAM BUGGAGE—RARE BOOKS 27a Charing Cross Road, London.

  Dear Lady Leishman,

  It is with ve