How Dear Is Life Read Online Free

a photograph of Zena Dare, to add to his new spring series of actresses, which was replacing his winter interest in boxers. Edgar went to the private line to Head Office. The handle of the dynamo whirred.
    “I hope his Yiddisher Pappy isn’t on the Black List,” laughed Downham. Phillip thought of the Black Line at his second school, and with head held down, went on with a short-period policy of Merchandise at Bellamy’s Wharf.
    “Guarantee Department on the line, sir.”
    “Thank you, Edgar,” said Mr. Hollis, springing off his stool, and saying as he hurried behind Phillip: “Good God no! Old Moses Cohen’s as honest as the day! He doesn’t need fire to purify spurious figures in his ledgers. Good morning, is that Guarantee? Get me Mr. Ironside, will you, please. Wine Vaults Lane speaking. Hullo, is that you, Ironside? I want to spread a risk, six thousand on contents of Moses Cohen’s clothing factory in Aldgate. Right. My thanks to you!” He hung the receiver on the brass bracket.
    “Yes, young Roy Cohen should bring us some useful business,” he said, smiling at Phillip as he passed his desk again. The smile encouraged Phillip to say,
    “What is a broker, sir?”
    “A broker, my lad, is a superior form of commission agent. Just as an Esquire, so described on a domestic policy, is a superior form of the general description, Gentleman. Now don’t you go and call Mr. Tate, when you make out the policy for the new country house he is building for sixty thousand pounds, a Gentleman. He’s an Esquire. He wouldn’t like it if he found himself among the sort of people, worthy folk as no doubt they are, insured under the agency of Mr. L. Dicks or even of the good grey Konigswinter! If in any doubt, ask me. See?”
    “Yes, Mr. Hollis.”
    Mr. Tate had recently come into the office. He was a beefy man with a very big red face, and a genial, hearty manner. He wore, Phillip noticed, a short vicuna jacket like his own, and with it the shiniest and biggest silk hat he had seen in the Lane so far. Indeed, he had been so impressed by the shininess of the hat of what Mr. Hollis called the Sugar King, that an idea had come to him as exciting as it was tempting: he would buy for himself such a hat when he got his first salary cheque. Why not? It was obviously correct, with vicuna jacket and striped trousers. Mr. Hollis sometimes came into the office so dressed, but with a morning tail-coat; so did Downham. They came through the door seemingly a little faster on these occasions, and certainly looking taller. On the other hand, Mr. Howlett always wore a lounge suit and a bowler, entering slowly, in his usual strolling walk. Mr. Howlett lived in Highgate, where, he told Phillip, were big carp in the ponds near his house. However, none of the fishermen on the banks ever seemed to catch them, he said, with a short laugh.
    “Well you know, it largely depends on the bait, sir,” said Phillip. “If they used aniseed on dough, well kneaded with cotton wool, the carp would not be able to suck it off. I got a fairly big carp like that, one day, in one of my uncle’s ponds in the country. ”
    “Where was that, in the Heybridge Basin?” asked Downham, with a laugh.
    “No,” said Phillip. “As a matter’r fact, it was at a place called Brickhill. The ponds there swarm with perch and roach, too. And duck, in season, flight there from the Duke’s moors.”
    Phillip wondered if he could get Uncle Jim Pickering to transfer his insurance policy to the Moon. That would show Downham! Would he be an Esquire? Probably not; all the same, he was a seed merchant, and secretary of the local gas company.
    Out of curiosity, when he was alone for a few minutes, he looked up Hollis’ policy. It was for £ 300, Household Goods, at a house at Woking in Surrey. Hollis had written it out himself, Harold Fazackerley Hollis , Esquire !There it was, in his galloping writing, with a Waverley nib. Then he looked up Mr. Howlett’s policy. He was