Free The Limehouse Text by Will Thomas Page A

in general, an uncouth-looking creature.
    “I hope you do not mind,” the dandy said. “There is nothing as unaesthetic as an enquiry agent, and I have a reputation for taking my frivolity seriously. I had to tell my friends you were bailiffs, like our friend here.”
    “As hard as you try,” Barker rumbled, “I doubt you could create a debt your father could not repay. Forbes, this is my assistant, Thomas Llewelyn. Thomas, the Honorable Pollock Forbes. Speaking of paying, Pollock, how do we stand on credit? Do I owe you or do you owe me?”
    Forbes ran a finger along his chin as he reflected. He had the longest, thinnest fingers I have ever seen. He was a casual looking fellow, in the latest style from Savile Row, a lounge suit. Despite the name, it looked expensive. “I believe I’m in your debt, old man, and it’s not the kind the pater can pay off. What are you working on?”
    “I have a case involving a book stolen from a Chinese monastery. The Chinese government and the Foreign Office are hunting for it. The latter is represented by Mr. Trelawney Campbell-Ffinch.”
    “Campbell-Ffinch. I haven’t heard that name in ages,” he said, fluttering a hand at a waiter in the hall. “Lonnie was in my house at Cambridge, a few years ahead of me. He’s always been a bully and a frightful bore. Chumley, bring us a bottle of the Veuve Clicquot, there’s a good chap.”
    The waiter, who had appeared silently at my elbow, glided off as quietly as he came. Something about Forbes’s inflection made me pause, and then it came to me. Like Barker, he was a Scot. Detective work was one of those occupations like engineering that seemed suited to the Scottish temperament.
    “You’ll like it, I think,” he said, referring to the wine. “The Royal has one of the best cellars in the world. To tell the truth, I didn’t know Lonnie was in London again. He’s like a bad sailor, always being posted farther and farther east. Something big must have occurred to have them dare bring him back. Is any of this in my line?”
    “It has international repercussions,” Barker said, “but I do not believe any heads shall roll, save for one fellow’s, who has been killing people to get the book.”
    “Where?”
    “The East End,” the Guv stated. “Limehouse.”
    “Isn’t that where…. Oh, yes, I see it now. Your late assistant was mixed up in this, was he not?”
    “He was.”
    The waiter arrived with the Clicquot and opened it with a ceremonial pop. I had never tasted pink champagne before. It was sweet and tickled my nose.
    Barker emptied his glass and set it back on the table. “Very nice,” he pronounced. I knew for a fact that he did not care for wine of any sort and I doubted he could tell a Dom Pérignon from a third-rate Italian table wine.
    Pollock Forbes coughed discreetly behind his hand. “So what exactly would you like me to undertake?” he asked.
    “I would like to know when Campbell-Ffinch arrived in London again and if he was summoned. I want to learn how he has been spending his free time and with whom. His knuckles are swollen. I believe he may have been fighting recently.”
    Forbes extracted a short pencil from his pocket and recorded the questions on his cuff. “Got it. Anything else?”
    “Have you ever heard of a Mr. K’ing?”
    “The Chinaman? Of course. I hear his name often. ‘Lost ten quid to Mr. K’ing at puck-a-poo,’ ‘Lost fifty poun’ at mah-jongg to that blighter K’ing.’ I gather between the gambling parlors and the opium dens, he’s doing all right for himself.”
    The snoring fellow in the corner had awakened and even now, they were setting his meal before him: game hens with pomme frites. I had heard the cooking here was as good as any restaurant in Paris. All the French political exiles ate here and why shouldn’t they? Even if the food were not superb, there was the authentic decor, as if a slice of Versailles like a three-layered cake had been set down in the middle of