But she could not get
Hodshon till she threatened to telephone elsewhere. At that, he said
he would postpone his other engagement and come right up.
Charity was disappointed in Mr. Hodshon. He looked so ordinary,
and yet he must know such terrible things about people. We always
expect doctors, lawyers, priests, and detectives to show the scars
of the searing things they know. As if we did not all of us know
enough about ourselves and others to eat our eyes out, if knowledge
were corrosive!
Charity was further disappointed in Hodshon's lack of
picturesqueness. He was like no detective she had read about
between Sherlock Holmes and Philo Gubb. He was like no detective
at all. It was almost impossible to accept him as her agent.
He seemed eager to help, however, and when she told him that she
suspected her husband of being overly friendly with an insect named
Zada L'Etoile, and that she wanted them shadowed, he betrayed a
proper agitation.
Now, of course, women's scandals are no more of a luxury to a
detective than their legs were to the bus-driver of tradition or to
any one in knee-skirted 1916. Mr. Hodshon was a good man as good men
go, though he was capable of the little dishonesties and compromises
with truth that characterize every profession. A man simply cannot
succeed as a teacher, lawyer, doctor, merchant, thief, author,
scientist, or anything else if he blurts out everything he knows
or believes. No preacher could occupy a pulpit for two Sundays who
told just what he actually thought or knew or could find out.
Pages:
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299