WALLACE'S BUTLER.

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 157, 6 July 1939, Page 9

WALLACE'S BUTLER.

AT MASTER'S GRAVE. "FINEST MAN I EVER MET." FAMOUS WRITER'S "TEA ! TASTER." (Special.—By Air Mail.) LONDOX, June 3. Flowers were placed this week on the grave of Edgar Wallace, at Bourne End. Buckinghamshire, near his old home, by Mr. Robert Downs, Wallace's former butler. He comes from Maidenhead regularly to visit the grave, and his flowers are the only ones ever put i there. Mr. Downs, who is 20 years old. cniiies of a family of butlers. But since his. master's death Robert has had no heart for his old profession. He is now an inspector of gas meters. He began work as a handy boy at Chalklands, Wallace's home at Bourne End, and became more friend than servant to him. Always Wallace wanted Robert near him" and only a short time before his death he asked him to bring his dressing- gown and tea, sure indications that he was going to write.

Mr. Downs was affectionately known by Wallace ae the "Tea Taster." No one else was allowed to make pot after pot when Wallace was in a wri r -g mood.

"When the chief died," Mr. Downs said, "I lost my liest friend. Really, he spoiled me from taking another butler's post. Wherever we travelled I went first olhss like himself. If ever I was in doubt or trouble he would always help me out. He wae the finest man I have ever met.

"I remember him," he said, "because it is the memory of him that inspires me- and keeps me going."