ABOUT HIPPOT

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0><tr> <td valign="top" rowspan="2" width=185 BGCOLOR="#FFFBF0" TEXT="#080000" bgproperties="fixed" background="468b9642eearkz.png"> <div> <IMG SRC="40d82820.png" border=0 width="130" height="130" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="HOME"><U><IMG SRC="41b2c1a0.png" border=0 width="44" height="26" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id11.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="HIPPOT FAQS"><U><IMG SRC="41c2c1a0.png" border=0 width="44" height="26" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id6.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="THE COMPLEAT HIPPOT"><U><IMG SRC="41daa1a0.png" border=0 width="170" height="26" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id12.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="FREE DOWNLOADS"><U><IMG SRC="4af5e1b0.png" border=0 width="94" height="27" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id3.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="ABOUT THE AUTHOR"><U><IMG SRC="41e9e1b0.png" border=0 width="158" height="27" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id8.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="CONTACT US"><U><IMG SRC="421591b0.png" border=0 width="89" height="27" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id4.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="COPYRIGHTS"><U><IMG SRC="422a41a0.png" border=0 width="164" height="26" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></U></A></div> <div> <B>Copyright 2014</B></div> </td> <td valign="top" colspan=2 height=65 BGCOLOR="#FFFBF0" TEXT="#080000" bgproperties="fixed" background="43710411eearkz.png"> <div> <B><IMG SRC="452a5230.png" border=0 width="165" height="35" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></div> </td> </tr><tr> <td valign="top" height=415 colspan=2 BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000"> <bR> <div> <B><IMG SRC="15cf0280.png" border=0 width="240" height="40" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></div> <bR> <div> <B><IMG SRC="46b85170.png" border=0 width="389" height="23" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></B></div> <bR> <div> <B>5 January, 1937</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Dear Stewart,</B><B> </B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Thanks for your note of the seventeenth. </B></div> <div> <B>Funny you should have asked about Hercule Hippot as I ran into Colonel Pastings just last month on Curzon Street. Do you remember him?  I hadn't seen him since Gibraltar but his photo has been in the newspapers often enough since he started working for this Hippot chap. Pastings agreed to join me for luncheon at the Ritz Grill, so we hailed a taxi and off we went.</B></div> <div> <B>     “Well,” I said when we were settled into our booth, “I read about your sorting out the Loch Ness Monster a few weeks back. Quite an adventure by the sound of it. And before that I recall the business with the Crown Jewels. The newspapers have it that you're a sort of a Dr. Watson to this Hippot. He seems an unlikely sort for a detective. He's French, isn't he?”</B></div> <div> <B>     Pastings set me straight. “No, a Luxembourgian.  Used to be the head of the police force over there. Don't know why he left, exactly. Anyway, he came over here a few years after the Armistice. It was about ten years ago I met him. He was already quite famous by then.”</B></div> <div> <B>     “He seems to be a very brilliant chap from what I've read,” I said.</B></div> <div> <B>     Pastings nodded. “Oh yes, very keen mind, very keen. What's the name of that German bloke? Einstein? If Einstein ever decided to get into the detective business he wouldn't be a patch on Hippot, I'll tell you.” Pastings tapped the side of his head with a finger. “Hippot says it's all in his `little grey cells.' ”</B></div> <div> <B>     I laughed. “Is he really as eccentric as we're led to believe?”</B></div> <div> <B>     “All that and more, old boy.”</B></div> <div> <B>     “So how did you come to work for him?”</B></div> <div> <B>     “Funny story, that. Just fell into it. I was coming out of my club one afternoon and I saw him at the kerb. I recognized him at once, of course. He was looking for a tea room he'd heard about. He's awfully fussy about his tea, and buns, and cakes, and dessert sorts of things. Has a terrible sweet tooth - says sweets are what keep his little grey cells in shape. It happened that I knew the place he was looking for and I took him there. We got quite matey. When he found out I was retired and had a car he asked me if would be interested in taking him about. Helping out on his cases, I mean. He doesn't drive, you see, and isn't terribly fond of busses or the Underground. Likes steamships, though, and trains, especially the posh ones like the Orient Express.”</B></div> <div> <B>     “That was how he caught Willie the Weasel, wasn't it? On the Orient Express?”</B></div> <div> <B>     “Oh yes, that was one of his most cunning plans. Chief Inspector Naff of Scotland Yard was quite grateful, if I do say. That Weasel was a nasty piece of work.”</B></div> <div> <B>     “I seem to remember reading about a lady working with you on the Weasel case,” I said.</B></div> <div> <B>     “Right. That's our Miss Pinkie. She's sort of a - well, she's supposed to be a secretary but she rather takes charge of things. Couldn't manage without her. Funny girl, though. Almost seems clairvoyant at times.”</B></div> <div> <B>     “How do you mean?”</B></div> <div> <B>     “Oddest thing. Hippot had opened his offices in Portman Square and was thinking about getting a secretary but hadn't actually contacted an agency or anything. And then one morning he came in and there she was at a desk typing away at some letters like she'd been there for years. Never knew where she came from. Extraordinary. Quite indispensable to us now. We rely on her completely.”</B></div> <div> <B>     So that's the story on Hippot. Pastings and I nattered on for another hour or so. He seemed to think Hippot's adventures might make a good book and I wasn't doing anything just then so I had a go at writing up some of them up for him. I could send you a few if you're interested. </B></div> <div> <B>     See you Thursday night at the club.</B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Cheers,</B></div> <div> <IMG SRC="0142c130.png" border=0 width="44" height="19" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>