With that, Superintendent Gowry laid the sheet of paper down and Verity, his eyes furtively downcast, made out the signature of Sir Charles Phipps and, to one side, the single and magisterial word of endorsement: 'Albert'.
Inspector Croaker slackened his stance in order to snap to attention again, his voice cracking out across the room as though on the square at Woolwich.
'Sir! As officer commanding the Private-Clothes detail and, therefore, responsible for ordering the warning to HMS Hero, I should deem it the greatest privilege to serve His Royal Highness in any capacity that might be chosen for me, sir!'
The breath went from Verity's body, as though he had been struck by a mighty fist. Superintendent Gowry shuffled his hands together awkwardly.
'Mr Croaker, I understand - the Commissioner understands - that the duties anticipated for an additional officer of the Prince's bodyguard would hardly be of a dignity to match such a rank as your own. . . .'
'Sir!' said Croaker, swallowing greedily, 'there is no duty I would consider beneath me in the service of Her Majesty and His Highness!'
He looked, as Verity later remarked to Samson, as though he might be about to fetch up his dinner all over the Superintendent's carpet. Gowry shook his head.
'Commendable though your sense of duty is, Mr Croaker,
I fear the private instructions from the Prince Consort are very plain. It is the officer who reached the Wolf Rock buoy and shone the red light there who is wanted as part of the bodyguard. He will, of course, be subordinate to the other officers and will mess with the royal servants. But it is Sergeant Verity who has been asked for.'
Croaker's porcine little eyes went very round and bright, as though expressing unfathomable agony.
'Sir!' he said, exhaling the word protractedly and investing it with all the submission and hate, obedience to duty and loathing of the fat complacent sergeant, which surged and mingled in his tormented mind.
'Why?' asked Bella, with a scepticism which almost bordered on resentment, 'I don't see why it should be a reward to take you from home and a wife that loves you, and send you off to foreign parts again. You only just got back from Portman Square and Plymouth, and all that!'
The moonlight streamed through the thin curtains of the open window, while scents of the summer street, distantly obnoxious, lingered in the warm air. In the cradle at Bella's side, the infant Verity snuffled, woke and began to shift about protestingly at the sound of voices.
'A man gotta take such duty as its own reward,' said Verity firmly.
'Eye-wash!' she said, determinedly turning her back.
'No it ain't, Mrs Verity. It's the truth, and you know it is! Your father brought you up to know that all right.'
Her voice was half muffled by the pillow when she replied.
'Pa says there's some duties ain't as bad as you make out. He says. . . .'
'Yes, Mrs Verity?'
"e says,' she blurted, 'when you was hauling that unfortunate young person about in that rowing-boat . . . 'e says he bets you gave her a good touch-up in the right places!'
Appalled at such a repetition from Bella, it took him a moment to regain his composure.
'Yes,' he said at length. 'Well, I got a great respect for your old father as, in course, I'm obliged to have. But there ain't no question that Mr Stringfellow's mind stands in need of a bit of refinement.'
They lay apart, in careful isolation from one another, for several minutes. Then Verity turned caressingly towards her.
'After all,' he said softly, 'it ain't for long, Bella. Only a month or so. Nothing like going off to 'indoostan that time!'
'But why've you got to be a bodyguard, Mr Verity?'
'Well,' said Verity, as though no less puzzled than his wife, 'there's Canadians that don't like belonging to us, a-cos of being Frenchies. And there's Yankees wot don't much like us neither. Some do, some don't. But it's a secret that he's going to such places as New York. He's going under an alias, and you ain't to say a word about it, not even to Mr Stringfellow. You wouldn't want 'is 'ighness foully murdered, would you?'
'No,' she said meekly.
Verity's hand patted Bella's plump little thigh consolingly.
'Well, then,' he said. 'It'll be all right, you see if it ain't. And I'll be back in no time at all. And we gotta behave a bit more special now, being members of the royal 'ousehold, in a manner of speaking.'
Bella gasped.
'Are we? Members of'is 'ighness' household?'
'In a manner o' speaking,' said Verity hastily. 'But it means behaving very proper and setting an example round here.'
'You and me and Mr Stringfellow?' she whispered wonderingly.
'Well,' said Verity doubtfully, 'Mr Stringfellow might have to be a bit more genteel first.'
Bella began to giggle. Verity held out at first, and then emitted a snorting guffaw. The bed shook violently under their mirth and there was an angry wail from the cradle. Bella ignored it as they wrestled softly together.
'I 'ope,' she gasped presently, 'I 'ope that when the poor young Prince comes back safe ... I 'ope, Mr Verity, that you're sent to live home for always and always!'
SV - 03 - Sergeant Verity Presents His Compliments Page 28