The Nine Tailors

Wimsey examines the laundered clothing of the murdered man. The outerwear is of English manufacture, but the underwear is French. He thinks, “It puzzled him that Cranton, last seen in London in September, should possess a French vest and pants so much worn and so carefully repaired […] Why should Cranton be wearing second-hand French underclothes?” (184). Wimsey wonders if Cranton might have been corresponding with someone in France. He and Bunter decide to visit the surrounding villages to see if their post offices have any unclaimed letters from overseas.

As they travel back and forth from Fenchurch, they meet an old sluice-keeper at the bridge out of town who adjusts the water levels to prevent flooding in his region. He strikes up a conversation with Wimsey and complains that the government won’t send him a new sluicegate to replace his worn one. The old man grouses, “What I says is, Why don’t they refer it to Geneva? See? Why don’t they refer it to Geneva? Then we might get it, same time as they gets disarmament, see?” (200). Wimsey is amused by the pithy comment and chats with the old man on many subsequent visits across his bridge.