ADVANTAGE?' enquired Pitman shrewdly.

'You innocent mutton,' said Michael, 'it's the seediest commonplace in

the English language, and only proves the advertiser is an ass. Let me

demolish your house of cards for you at once. Would Uncle Tim make

that blunder in your name?--in itself, the blunder is delicious, a huge

improvement on the gross reality, and I mean to adopt it in the future;

but is it like Uncle Tim?'

'No, it's not like him,' Pitman admitted. 'But his mind may have become

unhinged at Ballarat.'

'If you come to that, Pitman,' said Michael, 'the advertiser may be

Queen Victoria, fired with the desire to make a duke of you. I put it

to yourself if that's probable; and yet it's not against the laws of

nature. But we sit here to consider probabilities; and with your genteel

permission, I eliminate her Majesty and Uncle Tim on the threshold. To

proceed, we have your second idea, that this has some connection with

the statue. Possible; but in that case who is the advertiser? Not

Ricardi, for he knows your address; not the person who got the box, for

he doesn't know your name. The vanman, I hear you suggest, in a lucid

interval. He might have got your name, and got it incorrectly, at the

station; and he might have failed to get your address. I grant the

vanman. But a question: Do you really wish to meet the vanman?'

'Why should I not?' asked Pitman.

230

The Wrong Box