Edward Phillips Oppenheim

“ For thirty years he works as a man should—for it's what a man's made for—and thanks to his wife's help and advice he prospers. Look at him, I ask you! A baby can see that he hasn't the brains of a chicken. Yet there he stands—Joseph H. Bundercombe, of Bundercombe's Reapers, with eight million dollars' worth of stock to his name!"
I saw Reggie's eyes go up to the ceiling and I knew he was dividing eight million dollars by five. ”

“ My husband, Joseph H. Bundercombe, a suspect at Scotland Yard, followed everywhere by detectives; and my daughter——"
"Stepdaughter, please," Eve interrupted.
"Stepdaughter then!—talking about marrying a man she's probably known about twenty-four hours and met at a bar or in a thieves' kitchen, or something of the sort! If you must marry an Englishman," she continued with rising voice, "why don't you marry Lord Reginald Sidley there? His father is an earl, anyway."
"His uncle's one," Reggie put in gloomily, jerking his head toward me. "Old Walmsley's all right."
Eve patted his hand. ”

“ Do you know I've had to desert my post as president of the Great Amalgamated Meeting of the Free Women of the West to come and look after you two? Do you know that three thousand women had to listen to a substitute last Thursday?—and after I'd spent two months getting my facts for them! ”

“ I promised. "He's one of the best!"
"He's so clever, too!"
"Clever, without a doubt," I admitted, "only I think perhaps we might get him to use his talents in a more orthodox way. By the by," I added, putting my head out of the window, "I think it's getting a little chilly."
I ordered the taxi closed and we returned to the hotel. The hall porter drew me on one side confidentially.
"Mr. Bundercombe and the other gentleman, sir," he announced, "are waiting for you in the bar." ”