All Honourable Men

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On Tuesday nights the hotel had a violinist and a pianist in the parlour. This was odd because in every other way it was the sort of hotel where, if you asked for an extra blanket, you got told instead how warm a night it was. But the best musicians did not play in Gloucester Road hotels, and Lajos Gottlich had heard their small repertoire too often already, so he escaped to the dimly gas-lit lobby. To go out meant spending money, but he might manage to borrow an evening paper off the receptionist.

However, the receptionist was listening to some tale being spun by the out-of-work Irish chauffeur who had been there only a week (and had asked for “Danny Boy” on his first evening; he had got “In a Monastery Garden” for his impertinence). Lajos heard the receptionist say: “A Rolls-Royce?” so he paused, half-hidden behind an aspidistra plant, and listened.

“Can you drive one?” the receptionist was asking.

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