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“Oh, of course,” the major said. He smiled benignly at Canidy. “That place in the country.”
“Why do I feel I’m making an ass of myself?” Canidy asked.
“David and I are friends from Los Angeles,” Fine said. “Peter, too.”
“By Los Angeles, you mean ‘Hollywood’?” Canidy asked. He turned to the major. “You’re in the movie business?”
“Not anymore,” the major said. “But yes, I was.”
“He was an elocution coach,” Private Ustinov said. “I was a ballet instructor. ”
“Oh,” Canidy said.
“I taught them, you see, to walk, and then David took over and taught them how to talk,” Private Ustinov said.
“Well, I’ve obviously made a mistake,” Canidy said. “You looked like a British officer I met. Sandhurst type.”
“Well, I’m guilty of that,” the major said. “I went to Sandhurst.”
“Oh,” Canidy said,“no offense intended, of course.”
“And certainly none taken,” the major said.
“You have seen Major Niven before, Dick,” Fine said.
“I knew I had,” Canidy said.
“On the great silver screen,” Fine said. “This is the actor.”
“Actors, if you please,” Private Ustinov said. “Currently not on the boards, of course, but actors, plural, nonetheless.”
Only at that moment did Canidy recognize David Niven.
“I know what I’m going to do,” he said. “I’m going to go back to the lobby, and then come in again, and walk over and ask for an autograph.”
“I would much prefer a taste, if you don’t mind,” Niven said, “of what I suspect Lady Agnes has in the bags.”
“There is no booze,” Private Ustinov said. “David and I came here in the hope that Stanley, who has some mysterious but steady source of intoxicants, would show up sooner rather than later.”
“Booze, Sergeant!” Canidy said.
“Sir!” she said, and produced a bottle of Scotch.
“Have we met, Major?” Agnes asked when she had poured everyone a drink.
“Your father is the Earl of Hayme, isn’t he?” Niven asked. Agnes nodded. “I thought so. I’ve been privileged to shoot over your estate in Scotland several times. The last time I saw you, you were a little girl. A spectacular little girl, obviously; you stuck in my mind.”
“I didn’t know you were a blue blood, Agnes,” Canidy said.
Agnes flashed him a brilliant smile.
“Begging the major’s pardon, sir, there is a good deal about me the major doesn’t know,” she said sweetly.
Chapter FIVE
It was nearer to seven than six when Commander Edwin W. Bitter and Miss Ann Chambers reached the bar at the Dorchester. Once they had left Admiral Foster’s Connaught Hotel suite, they sent Mr. Meachum Hope, Lt. Commander Dolan, and Lieutenant Kennedy on ahead of them to the Dorchester. Then they went to the London bureau of Chambers News Service.
There Bitter wrote a short, awkward letter to his wife. The gist of the letter was that Sarah, despite what she was going to read in the newspapers tomorrow, or what she was liable to hear on Meachum Hope’s “Report from London” broadcast, was not to worry. What he had done was neither as heroic nor as difficult as they were making it sound.
