The Affair of the Bloodstained Egg Cosy Read Online Free Page A

old guard of stuffed shirt diplomats - all hot air and protocol. I wanted someone I could talk to, who understands me, and whom I understand. You know just as much about the situation as any of those old buffers.'
    'Yes, I believe I do, and I do not want you to think I am not grateful for your confidence. It is merely that I cannot bear the thought that I might fail my country. The situation is so perilous—'
    'You don't need to tell me that, old buddy. But I don't see in what way you could let the country down. If we should fail, I'd be to blame. But the British aren't our enemies. They want to help. These are just going to be cosy, informal talks to decide the precise details of how best they can help - and how we can best repay them.'
    'You make it sound very easy. But I have this feeling that things are not going to proceed quite as smoothly as you anticipate.'
    'You're a natural-born pessimist,' said Adler.
    * * *
    'Blasted foreigners.' George Henry Aylwin Saunders, twelfth Earl of Burford, muttered the words as he sat in a wicker chair on the terrace at Alderley, gazing out across the tree-dotted parkland, baking under the summer sun.
    A few yards from him, a hammock had been slung from a hook on the wall of the house to the spreading branch of a nearby tree. At that moment the only indication that Lord Burford was not simply soliloquizing was a bulge in the underside of the hammock; but after a quarter of a minute his daughter's voice from inside it murmured: 'Which ones? Richard's? What's wrong with them?'
    Ten seconds passed before Lord Burford said: 'Coming here. Disturbin' things. Having to be entertained. Shown round. Talked to. Not understandin' English all over the place. Deuced unsportin' of Rich to foist 'em on us. I blame your mother, I'd have said no.'
    'You wouldn't - any more than you did to Algy.'
    'Well, no, p'raps I wouldn't. But I'd have said yes in a grumblin' manner. Algy Fotheringay's different. No one can keep him away when he decides to pay a visit. He's like a 'flu germ.'
    'Well, what about the Peabodys? You invited them, too.'
    'Couldn't very well get out of it. Been correspondin' with the feller for donkey's years. When he wrote saying they were coming to England and he'd like an opportunity of examinin' me collection I had no choice. But I didn't want 'em here.'
    'You'll thoroughly enjoy having them. You love showing off your guns.'
    'Not to Peabody. I know these Americans. He'll keep insistin' how much better his stuff is, and crowing over this new piece he's picked up in Italy. Yankees!'
    'I thought he was a Texan.'
    'He is. Why?'
    'I don't think he'd take very kindly to being called a Yankee.'
    'Why not?'
    'A Yankee's an American from the northern states. Even you must know Texas is in the south.'
    'Oh, I can't be bothered with these fine distinctions. Americans - Yankees - foreigners: they're all the same. I don't mind entertainin', but I like to choose me guests. And I like 'em to be English. But when the party consists of two central Europeans, two Yankees, and the only two Englishmen are some septic civil servant and Algy Fotheringay, it makes a chap feel like emigratin'.'
    'Perk up. Jane's coming too, remember? You like her.'
    'Course I do. Charming gal. Wish all your chums were as presentable. She doesn't make up for the others, though. I think we're in for a ghastly few days; and you know one of the worst things about it? However gruesome things get, I won't be able to blame your mother. She didn't invite one of 'em.'
    'Perhaps she'll meet somebody up in town today and ask them down.'
    'If she does, it'll be somebody absolutely charming, who'll be personally responsible for saving the weekend from complete disaster. You mark my words.'
    * * *
    'Excuse me, but it is Lady Burford, isn't it?'
    The Countess of Burford paused in her leisurely examination of Messrs Harrod's furnishing fabrics and surveyed the speaker through her lorgnette. He was a tall, bronzed young man with deep-set