Busman’s Honeymoon

Chapter XIX. Prickly Pear

‘Peter, what were you dreaming about early this morning? It sounded pretty awful’

He looked vexed. ‘Oh, my God, have I started that again? I thought I’d learnt to keep my dreams to myself. Did I say things? Tell me the worst.’

‘I couldn’t make out what you said. But it sounded as though-to put it mildly-you had something on your mind.’

‘What an agreeable companion I must be,’ he said, bitterly. ‘I know. I’ve been told about it before. The perfect bedfellow-so long as I keep awake. I’d no business to risk it; but one always hopes one’s going to come right again some time. In future I’ll remove myself.’

‘Don’t be an idiot, Peter. You stopped dreaming as soon as I got hold of you.’

‘So I did. It comes back to me now… Fifteen of us, marching across a prickly desert, and we were all chained together. There was something I had forgotten-to do or tell somebody-but I couldn’t stop, because of the chain… Our mouths were full of sand, and there were flies and things… We were in dark blue uniforms, and we had to go on…’

He broke off. ‘I don’t know why blue uniforms-it’s usually something to do with the War. And telling one’s dreams is the last word in egotism.’

‘I want to hear it; it sounds pretty foul.’

‘Well, it was, in a way… Our boots were broken with the march… When I looked down, I saw the bones of my own feet, and they were black, because we’d been hanged in chains a long time ago and were beginning to come to pieces.’

‘Mais priez dieu que tous nous veuille absoudre.’

‘Yes, that’s it. Very like the Ballade des Pendus. Only it was hot, with a sky like brass-and we knew that the end of the journey would be worse than the beginning. And it was all my fault, because I’d forgotten-whatever it was.’

‘What was the end of it?’

‘It didn’t end. It changed when you touched me-something about rain and a bunch of chrysanthemums… Oh, it was only the old responsibility-dream, and a mild one at that. The funny thing is that I know there is something I’ve forgotten. I woke up with it on the tip of my tongue-but it’s gone.’

‘It’ll come back if you don’t worry it.’

‘I wish it would; and then I shouldn’t feel so guilty about it… Hullo, Bunter, what’s that? The post? Heaven above, man, what have you got there?’

‘Our silk hat, my lord.’

‘Silk hat? Don’t be ridiculous, Bunter. We don’t want that in the country.’

‘The funeral is this morning, my lord. I thought it possible your lordship might desire to attend it. The prayer-books are in the other parcel with the black suit.’

‘But surely to goodness I can go to a village funeral without a mourning suit and a top-hat!’

‘The conventional marks of esteem are highly appreciated in rural communities, my lord. But it is as your lordship wishes. Two vans have arrived to take the furniture, my lord, and Superintendent Kirk is below with Mr MacBride and Mr Solomons. With your lordship’s permission, I will suggest that I should take the car over to Broxford and order a few temporary necessities-such as a couple of camp-beds and a kettle.’

‘Peter,’ said Harriet, looking up from her correspondence, ‘there’s a letter from your mother. She says she is going down to the Dower House this morning. The shooting-party at the Hall has broken up, and Gerald and Helen are going for the weekend to Lord Attenbury’s. She wonders whether we should like to join her for a day or two. She thinks we may need rest and change-not from one another, she is careful to explain, but from what she calls housekeeping.’

‘My mother is a very remarkable woman. Her faculty for hitting the right nail on the head is almost miraculous, especially as all her blows have the air of being delivered at random. Housekeeping! The house is about all we’re likely to keep, by the looks of it.’

‘What do you think of her idea?’

‘It’s rather for you to say. We’ve got to go somewhere or other, unless you really prefer the kettle and the camp-bedstead to which Bunter so feelingly alludes. But it is said to be unwise to introduce the mother-in-law complication too early on.’

‘There are mothers-in-law and mothers-in-law.’

‘True; and you wouldn’t be bothered with the others-in-law, which makes a difference. We once talked about seeing the old place when we could do it on our own.’

‘I’d like to go, Peter.’

‘Very well, then, you shall. Bunter, send Her Grace a wire to say we’re coming down tonight.’

‘Very good, my lord.’

‘Heartfelt satisfaction,’ said Peter, as Bunter left them. ‘He will be sorry to abandon the investigation, but the camp-beds and the kettle would break even Bunter’s spirit. In a way I feel rather thankful to Mr Solomons for precipitating matters. We haven’t run away; we’ve received the order to retreat and can march out with all the honours of war.’

‘You really feel that?’

‘I think so. Yes, I do.’

Harriet looked at him and felt depressed, as one frequently does when one gets what one fancied one wanted. ‘You’ll never want to come back to this house again.’

He shifted uneasily. ‘Oh, I don’t know. I could be bounded in a nutshell… were it not that I have bad dreams.’

But he would always have bad dreams in that house while the shadow of failure lay on it… He pushed the subject aside by asking: ‘Any other news from the Mater?’

‘Not news, exactly. Of course, she’s awfully sorry we’ve been tr-r-roubled by all this. She thinks she has found us a very suitable pair of housemaids, to come in November. The chandelier is up, and every drop has been separately silenced so as not to jingle; she had the piano-tuner playing the piano at it for an hour on end, and it didn’t let out a single ting-a-ling. Ahasuerus caught a mouse on Tuesday night and put it in Franklin’s bedroom slipper. Your nephew had a little difference of opinion with a policeman but explained that he had been marrying off his uncle and escaped with a fine and a caution. That’s all. The rest is-well, it more or less amounts to saying she’s glad I can give you a good chit and it may not be a bad thing to begin with a little adversity.’

‘Perhaps she’s right. I’m thankful it was a good chit, anyhow. Meanwhile, here’s a note for you from Uncle Pandarus-I mean. Uncle Paul-enclosed in a letter to me in which he has the impertinence to hope that my addiction of late years to what he calls “intemperate orgies of virtue” have not left me too much out of practice for my métier d’époux. He recommends une vie réglée and begs I will not allow myself to become trop émotionné, since emotion tends to impair les forces vitales. I do not know anybody who can cram more cynical indelicacy into a letter of good advice than my Uncle Pandarus.’

‘Mine’s good advice, too; but it isn’t exactly cynical.’

(Mr Delagardie had, in fact, written: ‘My dear niece-I hope that my absurd, but on the whole agreeable nephew is contriving to fill your cup with the wine of life. May an old man who knows him well remind you that what is wine to you is bread to him. You are too sensible to be offended by cette franchise. My nephew is not sensible at all-il n’est que sensible et passablement sensuel. Il a plus besoin de vous que vous de lui; soyez genereuse-c’est une nature qu’on ne saurait gater. Il sent le besoin de se donner-de s’épancher; vous ne lui refuserez certes pas ce modeste plaisir. La froideur, la coquetterie meme, le tuent; il ne sait pas s’imposer; la lutte lui répugne. Tout cela, vous le savez déja.-Pardon! je vous trouve extrèmement sympathique, et je crois que son bienetre nous est cher si tous deux. Avec cela, il est marchand du bonheur a qui en veut; j’espere que vous trouverez en lui ce qui pourra vous plaire. Pour le rendre heureux, vous n’avez qu’a etre heureuse; il supporte mal les souffrances d’autrui. Recevez, ma chère nièce, mes voeux les plus sinceres.’)

Peter grinned. ‘I won’t ask what it is. The least said about Uncle Paul’s good advice, the soonest mended. He is a most regrettable old man, and his judgement is disgustingly sound. According to him I suffer from a romantic heart, which plays the cat-and-banjo with my realistic mind.’

(Mr Delagardie had, in fact, written: ‘… Cette femme te sera un point d’appui. Elle n’a connu j’usqu’ici que les chagrins de l’amour; to lui en apprendra les delices. Ella trouvera en toi des delicatesses imprevues, et qu’elle saura apprecier. Mais surtout, mon ami, pas de faiblesse! Ce n’est pas une jeune fille niaise et etourdie; c’est une intelligence forte, qui aime a resoudre les problemes par la tete. Il ne faut pas etre trop soumis; elle ne t’en saura pas gré. Il faut encore moins l’enjoler; elle pourra se raviser. II faut convaincre; je suis persuadé qu’elle se montrera magnanime. Tache de comprimer les élans d’un coeur chaleureux-ou plutot réserve-les pour ces moments d’intimité conjugale ou ils ne seront pas déplacés et pourront te servir a quelque chose. Dans toutes les autres circonstances, fais valoir cet esprit raisonneur dont tu n’es pas entierement dépourvu. A vos ages, il est nécessaire de préciser; on ne vient plus a bout d’une situation en se livrant a des étreintes effrénées et en poussant des cris déchirants. Raidis-toi, afin d’inspirer le respect a ta femme; en lui tenant tete tu lui foumiras le meilleur moyen de ne pas s’ennuyer…’)

Peter folded this epistle away with a grimace, and inquired: ‘Do you mean to go to the funeral?’

‘I don’t think so. I’ve got no black frock to do your top-hat credit, and I’d better stay here to keep an eye on the Solomons-MacBride outfit.’

‘Bunter can do that.’

‘Oh, no-he’s panting to attend the obsequies. I’ve just seen him brushing his best bowler. Are you coming down?’

‘Not for a moment. There’s a letter from my agent I’ve simply got to attend to. I thought I’d cleared everything up nicely, but one of the tenants has chosen this moment to create a tiresomeness. And Jerry has got himself into a jam with a woman and is really frightfully sorry to bother me, but the husband has turned up with the light of blackmail in his eye and what on earth is he to do?’

‘Great heavens! That boy again?’

‘What I shall not do is to send him a cheque. As it happens, I know all about the lady and gentleman in question, and all that is required is a firm letter and the address of my solicitor, who knows all about them too. But I can’t write downstairs, with Kirk oiling in and out of the windows and brokers’ men wrangling over the whatnot.’

‘Of course you can’t. I’ll go and see to things. Be busy and good… And I used to think you were God’s own idler, without a responsibility in the world!’

‘Property won’t run itself, worse luck! Nor yet nephews. Aha! Uncle Pandarus likes giving avuncular advice, does he? Trust me to distribute a little avuncular advice in the quarter where it will do most good. Every dog has his day… C’est bien, embrasse-moi… Ah, non! voyons, to me depeignes…Allons, hop! il faut etre serieux.’

Peter, having dealt with his correspondence and been persuaded, fretfully protesting, into a black suit and a stiff collar, came downstairs and found Superintendent Kirk about to take his leave, and Mr MacBride just issuing victor from a heated three-cornered argument between himself, Mr Solomons and a dusty-looking professional person who explained that he represented the executrix. What precise business arrangement had been come to. Peter did not ask and never discovered. The upshot seemed to be that the furniture was to go, Harriet (on Peter’s behalf) having waived all claim to it on the grounds (a) that they had so far paid nothing for the use of it, (b) that they would not have it if it were given away with a pound of tea and (c) that they were going away for the weekend and (d) would be glad to have it out of the house as soon as possible to make room for their own goods.

This point having been settled, Mr MacBride appealed to the Superintendent for leave to carry on. Kirk nodded gloomily.

‘No luck?’ asked Peter.

‘Not a ha’porth,’ said Kirk. ‘It’s as you said. Puffett and Bert Ruddle have left their marks all over the place upstairs, but there’s no telling if some of them wasn’t made last week. I There’s no dint on this floor, as there might be if a stone had been thrown down-but on the other ’and, this old oak is that ’ard, you couldn’t make any impression on it if you heaved rocks at it for a week. I dunno, I’m sure. I never see finger on, like.’

‘Have you tried squeezing Sellon through the window?’

‘Joe Sellon?’ Kirk snorted. ‘If you was to go down to the village, you’d see Joe Sellon. Coo! talk of a traffic jam! I never see nothing like it in all my born days There’s ’alf Pagford here and pretty well the ’ole of Broxford, and all them newspaper men from London, and the Broxford and Pagford Gazette and the North-Herts Advertiser and a chap with one of them moving-picture cameras, and cars that thick in front of the Crown nobody can’t get in, and such a mob round the bar, they can’t get served when they are in. Joe’s got more’n he can do. I’ve left my sergeant down there to lend ’im a hand. And,’ said the Superintendent, indignantly, ‘jest as we’d got about twenty cars parked neat and tidy in the lane by Mr Giddy’s field, up comes a kid and squeaks, “Oh, please, mister-can’t you let me by? I’ve brought the cow to bull”-and we ’ad to move ’em all out again. Aggravating ain’t the word. But there! It can’t last for ever, that’s a comfort; and I’ll bring Joe up here when the funeral’s over and out of the way.’

Mr MacBride’s men worked expertly. Harriet, watching the swift disintegration of her honeymoon house into a dusty desert of straw and packing-cases, rolled-up curtains and spidery pictures spreading their loose wires like springes, wondered whether the whole of her married life would have the same kaleidoscopic quality. Character is destiny: probably there was something in her and Peter that doomed them never to carry any adventure to its close without preposterous interruptions and abrupt changes of fortune. She laughed, as she assisted matters by tying a bunch of fire- irons together, and remembered what a married friend had once confided to her about her own honeymoon.

‘Jim wanted a peaceful place, so we went to a tiny fishing village in Brittany. It was lovely, of course, but it rained a good deal, and I Hunt- it was rather a mistake we had so little to do. We were very much in love, I don’t mean we weren’t-but there were a great many hours to get through, and it didn’t seem somehow quite the right thing just to sit down quietly and read a book. There’s something to be said, after all, for the sight-seeing kind of honeymoon-it does give one a programme.’

Well; things did not always go according to programme. Harriet looked up from the fire-irons and with some surprise observed Frank Crutchley.

‘Were you wanting any help, my lady?’

‘Well, Crutchley, I don’t know. Are you free this morning?’

Crutchley explained that he had brought a party over from Great Pagford for the funeral; but they were going to lunch at the Crown and would not be wanting him again till later on.

‘But don’t you want to go to the funeral? You’re in the Paggleham choir, aren’t you? And the vicar said something about a choral service.’

Crutchley shook his head.

‘I’ve had words with Mrs Goodacre-leastways, she ’ad words with me. That Kirk… interfering. It ain’t no business of Vicar’s wife about me and Polly Mason. I went up about ‘aving the banns published, and Mrs Goodacre set on me.’

‘Oh!’ said Harriet. She was not very well pleased with Crutchley herself; but since he obviously had no idea that Miss Twitter-ton had made her troubles public, it seemed better not to refer to the subject. By this time. Miss Twitterton was probably regretting that she had spoken. And to take the matter up with Crutchley would only emphasise the poor little woman’s humiliation by giving it importance. Besides, one of the removal-men was kneeling in the window, laying the bronze horsemen and other objects of art tenderly away in a packing-case, while another, on the step-ladder, had relieved the walls of the painted nun-or and was contemplating an attack on the clock.

‘Very well, Crutchley. You can give the men a hand if they need it.’

‘Yes, my lady. Shall I get some of this stuff out?’

‘Well-no, not for the moment.’ She turned to the man in the window, who had just placed the last atrocity in the case and was putting the lid on.

‘Do you mind leaving the rest of this room to the last? My husband will be coming back here after the funeral and may have one or two people with him. We shall need some chairs to sit on.’

‘Right you are, lady. Could we do a bit upstairs?’

‘Yes; certainly. And we shan’t want this room very long.’

O.K., lady. Come along. Bill, this way.’

Bill, a thin man with an apologetic moustache, came obediently down from the steps.

‘Right-ho, George. It’ll take us a bit o’ time to take down them four-posters.’

‘Can this man give you any help? He’s the gardener here.’

George eyed Crutchley, who had taken the steps and brought them back to the centre of the room. ‘There’s them plants in the green’us,’ said George. ‘We ain’t got no special instructions about them, but we was told to take everything.’

‘Yes; the plants will have to go, and the ones in here as well. But these will do later. Go and see to the greenhouse, Crutchley.’

‘And there’s a sight o’ things in the outhouse,’ said George. ‘Jack’s out there; he’d be glad of a hand with them.’

Crutchley put the steps back against the wall and went out. George and Bill departed upstairs. Harriet remembered that Peter’s tobacco and cigars were in the whatnot and collected them. Then, smitten by a sudden pang, she hastened out into the pantry. It was already stripped. With the Furies at her heels, she bounded down the cellar steps, not even pausing to remember what had once lain at the foot of them. The place was dark as Egypt, but she struck a match, and breathed again. All was well. The two-and-a-half dozen of port lay carefully ranged upon the racks; and in front of them was tacked a notice in large letters: HIS LORDSHIP’S PROPERTY. DO NOT TOUCH. Coming up into the light, she encountered Crutchley entering by the back door. He started at seeing her.

‘I went to see if the wine was all right. I see Bunter has put up a notice. But please tell the men specially that they mustn’t on any account lay a finger on those bottles.’

Crutchley broke into a wide smile that showed Harriet how attractive his face could be and threw light on the indiscretions of Miss Twitterton and Polly Mason.

‘They ain’t likely to forget, my lady. Mr Bunter, he spoke to them himself-very solemn. He sets great store by that wine, seemin’ly. If you could a-heard him yesterday ticking off Martha Ruddle-’

Harriet wished she had heard it, and was greatly tempted to ask for an eye-witness account of the scene; but considered that Crutchley’s forwardness of manner scarcely called for encouragement; besides, whether he knew it or not, he was in her bad books. She said, repressively:

‘Well; take care they don’t forget it.’

‘Very good. They can take the barrel, I suppose.’

‘Oh, yes-that doesn’t belong to us. Only the bottled beer.’

‘Very good, my lady.’

Crutchley went out again, without taking whatever it was he had come for, and Harriet returned to the sittingroom. With a kind of tolerant pity, she lifted the aspidistras from their containing pots and gathered them into a melancholy little group on the floor, together with a repellent little cactus like an over-stuffed pincushion and a young rubber-plant. She had seldom seen plants she could care less for, but they were faintly hallowed by sentimental association: Peter had laughed at them. She reflected she must be completely besotted about Peter, if his laughter could hallow an aspidistra.

‘Very well,’ said Harriet aloud to herself, ‘I will be besotted.’ She selected the largest aspidistra and kissed one of its impassive shining surfaces. ‘But,’ she added cheerfully to the cactus, ‘I won’t kiss you till you’ve shaved.’ A head came suddenly through the window and startled her.

‘Excuse me, lady,’ said the head. ‘Is that there perambulator in the outhouse yourn?’

‘What? Oh, dear no,’ said Harriet, with a vivid and sympathetic appreciation of Peter’s feelings the evening before. (I knew I should make a bloody fool of myself-they both seemed to be fated that way.) ‘It must be something the late owner picked up in a sale.’

‘Right you are, lady,’ said the head-Jack’s, presumably-and disappeared whistling.

Her own clothes were packed. Bunter had come up shortly after breakfast-while Peter was writing letters-and had discovered her struggling with the orange frock. After watching her thoughtfully for a few moments he had offered his assistance, and it had been accepted with relief. The more intimate parts of the business had, after all, been effected previously-though, when Harriet saw her underwear unpacked later on, she could not remember having used so much tissue paper and was surprised to know herself such a neat packer.

Anyhow; it was all done.

Crutchley came into the sittingroom, with a number of glasses on a tray.

‘Thought you might be needing these, my lady.’

Oh, thank you, Crutchley. How very sensible of you. Yes, we probably shall. Just put them down over there, would you?’

‘Yes, my lady.’ He seemed disposed to linger.

‘That fellow Jack,’ he said suddenly, after a pause, ‘wants to know what he’s to do with some of that tinned and bottled stuff.’

‘Tell him to leave it in the pantry.’

‘He don’t know which is yours, my lady.’

‘Everything with a Fortnum- &-Mason label. If there’s anything else, it probably belongs to the house.’

‘Very good, my lady… Shall you and his lordship be coming back here again, later on, if I might ask?’

‘Oh, yes, Crutchley-I’m sure we shall. Were you thinking about your job here? Of course. We may be going away for a time while alterations are done, but we should like you to keep the garden in order.’

‘Thank you, my lady. Very good.’ There was a slightly embarrassed silence. Then:

‘Excuse me, my lady. I was wonderin’-’ He had his cap in his hands, twisting it rather awkwardly…’-seem’ as me and Polly Mason is goin’ to get married, whether his lordship… We was meanin’ to start that garridge, only me ’avin’ lost that forty pound… If it might be a loan, my lady, we’d pay it back faithful-’

‘Oh, I see. Well, Crutchley, I can’t say anything about that. You must speak to his lordship yourself.’

‘Yes, my lady… If you was to put in a word for me, maybe…’

‘I’ll think about it.’

For the life of her, she could not infuse any genuine warmth into her tone; she wanted so much to say, ‘Are we to advance you the amount of Miss Twitterton’s savings, too?’ On the other hand, there was nothing unreasonable about the request, since Crutchley could not know how much she knew. The interview was ended, but the young man lingered, so that she was relieved to hear the car at the gate.

‘They’re coming back. They haven’t been very long.’

‘No, my lady; it don’t take long.’

Crutchley hesitated for a second, and went out.

It was quite a large party that entered-if they had all come in the Daimler they must have looked like an undertakers’ bean-feast; but no! the vicar was there, and he might have brought some of them in his own little car. He came in, wearing his cassock, with his surplice and Oxford hood over one arm while with the other he gave fatherly support to Miss Twitterton. She, Harriet saw at a glance, was in a much more resilient mood than she had been the evening before. Though her eyes were red with funerary tears, and she clutched a handkerchief with a sable border in her black-kid-gloved hand, the excitement of being chief mourner behind so important a hearse had evidently restored all her lost self-importance. Mrs Ruddle followed. Her mantle, of strange and ancient cut, glittered with black beads, and the jet ornaments on her bonnet danced even more gaily than they had done at the inquest. Her face was beaming. Bunter, following upon her heels, and burdened with a pile of prayerbooks and a severe-looking bowler, might, by contrast, have been the deceased’s nearest and dearest relative, so determined was his countenance in an appropriate gloom. After Bunter came. rather unexpectedly, Mr Puffett, in a curious greenish-black cutaway coat of incredible age, buttoned perilously across his sweaters over his working trousers. Harriet felt sure he must have been married in that coat. His bowler was not the bowler of Wednesday morning, but of the mashing curly-brimmed pattern affected by young bloods of the nineties.

‘Well!’ said Harriet, ‘here you all are!’

She hastened forward to greet Miss Twitterton, but was arrested mid-way by the entrance of her husband, who had stopped to put a rug over the radiator. He came in now with a touch of bravura, probably induced by self-consciousness. The effect of his sombre suit and scarf, rigidly tailored black overcoat, and tightly furled silk umbrella was slightly marred by the irresponsible tilt of his top-hat.

‘Hullo-ullo-ullo,’ said his lordship, genially. He grounded the umbrella, smiled diffidently, and removed the topper with a flourish.

‘Do come and sit down,’ said Harriet, recovering herself, and leading Miss Twitterton to a chair. She took the black kid hand and squeezed it comfortingly.

‘Jerusalem, my happy home!’ His lordship surveyed his domain and apostrophised it with some emotion. ‘Is this the city that men call the perfection of beauty? Woe to the spoiler-the chariots of Israel and the horsemen thereof!’

He appeared to be in that rather unreliable mood which is apt to follow upon attendance at funerals and other solemn functions.

Harriet said severely, ‘Peter, behave yourself,’ and turned quickly to ask Mr Goodacre:

‘Were there many people at the funeral?’

‘A very large attendance,’ replied the vicar. ‘Really a remarkable attendance.’

‘It’s most gratifying,’ cried Miss Twitterton, ‘-all this respect for Uncle.’ A pink flush spread over her cheeks-she looked almost pretty. ‘Such a mass of flowers! Sixteen wreaths-including your beautiful tribute, dear Lady Peter.’

‘Sixteen!’ said Harriet. ‘Just fancy!’ She felt as though she had received a sharp jolt over the solar plexus.

‘And fully choral!’ continued Miss Twitterton! ‘Such touching hymns. And dear Mr Goodacre-’

The Reverend’s words,’ pronounced Mr Puffett, ‘if I may say so, sir, went right to the ’eart.’

He pulled out a large red cotton handkerchief with white spots and trumpeted into it briskly.

‘Ow,’ agreed Mrs Ruddle, ‘it was all just beautiful. I never seen a funeral to touch it, and I been to every buryin’ in Paggleham these forty year and more.’

She appealed to Mr Puffett for confirmation, and Harriet seized the opportunity to question Peter:

‘Peter, did we send a wreath?’

‘God knows. Bunter-did we send a wreath?’

‘Yes, my lord. Hothouse lilies and white hyacinths.’

‘How very chaste and appropriate!’ Bunter said he was much obliged.

‘Everybody was there,’ said Miss Twitterton. ‘Dr Craven came over, and old Mr and Mrs Sowerton, and the Jenkinses from Broxford and that rather odd young man who came to tell us about Uncle William’s misfortunes, and Miss Grant had all the school-children carrying flowers.’

‘And Fleet Street in full force,’ said Peter. ‘Bunter, I see glasses on the radio cabinet. We could do with some drinks.’

‘Very good, my lord.’

‘I’m afraid they’ve commandeered the beer-barrel,’ said Harriet, with a glance at Mr Puffett.

‘That’s awkward,’ said Peter. He stripped off his overcoat, and with it his last vestige of sobriety. ‘Well, Puffett, I dare say you can make do for once with the bottled variety. First discovered, so they say, by Izaak Walton, who while fishing one day-’

Into the middle of this harangue there descended unexpectedly from the stairs Bill and George, carrying, the one a dressing-mirror and a wash-basin, and the other, a ewer and a small bouquet of bedroom utensils. They seemed pleased to see the room so full of company, and George advanced gleefully upon Peter.

‘Excuse me, guv’nor,’ said George, flourishing the utensils vaguely in the direction of Miss Twitterton, who was sitting near the staircase. ‘All them razors and silver-mounted brushes up there-’

‘Tush!’ said his lordship, gravely, ‘nothing is gained by coarseness.’ He draped his coat modestly over the offending crockery, added his scarf, crowned the ewer with his top-hat, and completed the effect by hanging his umbrella over George’s extended arm. ‘Trip it featly here and there through the other door and ask my man to come up presently and tell you which things are what.’

‘Right-oh, guv’nor,’ said George, ambling away a trifle awkwardly, for the topper showed a tendency to overbalance. The vicar, surprisingly, relieved the general embarrassment by observing with a reminiscent smile:

‘Now, you might not believe it, but when was up at Oxford I once put one on the Martyrs’ Memorial.’

‘Did you?’ said Peter. ‘I was one of the party that tied an open umbrella over each of the Caesars. They were the Fellows’ umbrellas. Ah! here come the drinks.’

‘Thank you,’ said Miss Twitterton. She shook her head sadly at the glass. ‘And to think that the last time we partook of Lord Peter’s sherry-’

‘Dear me, dear me!’ said Mr Goodacre. “Thank you. Ah! yes, indeed.’ He turned the wine musingly upon his tongue and appeared to compare its flavour favourably with that of the best sherry in Pagford.

‘Bunter-you’ve got some beer in the kitchen for Puffett.’

‘Yes, my lord.’

Mr Puffett, reminded that he was, in a manner of speaking, in the wrong place, picked up his curly bowler and said heartily:

‘That’s very kind of your lordship. Come along, Martha. Get off your bonnet and shawl and we’ll give these lads a and outside.’

‘Yes,’ said Harriet. ‘Bunter will be wanting you, Mrs Ruddle, to see about getting some lunch of some sort. Will you stay and have something with us. Miss Twitterton?’

‘Oh, no, really. I must be getting home. It’s so good of you.’

‘But you mustn’t hurry,’ said Harriet, as Puffett and Mrs Ruddle vanished. ‘I only said that because Mrs Ruddle though an excellent servant in her way-sometimes needs a reminder. Mr Goodacre, won’t you have a drop more sherry?’

‘No, really-I must be moving homewards.’

‘Not without your plants,’ said Peter. ‘Mr Goodacre has prevailed on Mr MacBride, Harriet, to let the cacti go to a good home.’

‘For a consideration, no doubt?’

‘Of course, of course,’ said the vicar. ‘I paid him for them. That was only right. He has to consider his clients. The other person-Solomons, I think his name is-made a slight difficulty, but we managed to get over that.’

‘How did you manage?’

‘Well,’ admitted the vicar, ‘I paid him too. But it was a small sum. Quite a small sum, really. Less than the plants are worth. I did not like to think of their going to a warehouse with no one to care for them. Crutchley has always looked after them so well. He is very knowledgeable with cacti.’

‘Indeed?’ said Miss Twitterton, so sharply that the vicar stared at her in mild astonishment. ‘I am glad to hear that Frank Crutchley fulfilled some of his obligations.’

‘Well, padre,’ said Peter, ‘rather you than me. I don’t like the things.’

‘They are not to everybody’s taste, perhaps. But this one, for instance-you must acknowledge that it is a superb specimen of its kind.’

He shuffled his short-sighted way towards the hanging cactus and peered at it with an anticipatory pride of possession.

‘Uncle William,’ said Miss Twitterton in a quavering voice, ‘always took great pride in that cactus.’

Her eyes filled with tears, and the vicar turned quickly towards her.

‘I know. Indeed, Miss Twitterton, it will be quite happy and safe with me.’

Miss Twitterton nodded, speechlessly; but any further demonstration was cut short by the entrance of Bunter, who said, coming up to her:

‘Excuse me. The furniture removers are about to clear the attics and have desired me to inquire what is to be done with the various trunks and articles labelled “Twitterton”.’

‘Oh! dear me! Yes of course. Oh, dear-yes, please tell them I think I had better come and see to that myself… You see-dear me!-however did I come to forget?-there are quite a lot of my things here.’ She fluttered towards Harriet. ‘I hope you won’t mind-I won’t trespass on your time-but I’d better just see what’s mine and what isn’t. You see, my cottage is so very small, and Uncle very kindly let me store my little belongings-some of dear Mother’s things-’

‘But of course,’ said Harriet. ‘Do go anywhere you like, and if you want any help-’

‘Oh, thank you so much. Oh, Mr Goodacre, thank you.’

The vicar, politely holding open the staircase door, extended his hand.

‘As I shall be going in a very few minutes, I’ll say goodbye now. Just for the moment. I shall of course come and see you. And now, you mustn’t allow yourself to brood, you know. In fact. I’m going to ask you to be very brave and sensible and come and play the organ for us on Sunday as usual. Now, will you? We’ve all come to rely on you so much.’

‘Oh, yes-on Sunday. Of course, dear Mr Goodacre, if you wish it, I’ll do my best-’

‘It will gratify me very much.’

‘Oh, thank you. I-you-everybody’s so good to me.’

Miss Twitterton vanished upstairs in a little whirl of gratitude and confusion.

‘Poor little woman! poor little soul!’ said the vicar. ‘It’s most distressing. This unsolved mystery hanging over us-’

‘Yes,’ said Peter, absently; ‘not too good.’

It gave Harriet a shock to see his eyes, coldly reflective, still turned towards the door by which Miss Twitterton had gone out. She thought of the trap-door in the attic-and the boxes. Had Kirk searched those boxes, she wondered. If not-well, then, what? Could there be anything in a box? A blunt instrument, with perhaps a little skin and hair on it? It seemed to her that they had all been standing silent a very long time, when Mr Goodacre, who had resumed his doting contemplation of the cactus, suddenly said:

‘Now, this is very strange-very strange indeed!’

She saw Peter start as it were out of a trance and cross l the room to see the strange thing. The vicar was staring. up into the nightmare vegetable above his head with a deeply i puzzled expression. Peter stared too; but, since the bottom of the pot was three or four inches over his head, he could see very little.

‘Look at that!’ said Mr Goodacre, in a voice that positively shook. ‘Do you see what that is?’

He rumbled in his pocket for a pencil, with which he pointed excitedly to something in the centre of the cactus.

‘From here,’ said Peter, stepping back, ‘it looks like a spot of mildew, though I can’t see very well from this distance. But perhaps in a cactus that’s merely the bloom of a healthy complexion.’

‘It is mildew,’ said the vicar, grimly. Harriet, feeling that intelligent sympathy was called for, climbed on the settle, so that she could look at the plant on a level.

‘There’s some more of it on the upper side of the leaves if they are leaves, and not stalks.’

‘Somebody,’ said Mr Goodacre, ‘has been giving it too much water.’ He looked accusingly from husband to wife.

‘We haven’t any of us touched it,’ said Harriet. She stopped, remembering that Kirk and Bunter had handled it. But they were scarcely likely to have watered it.

‘I’m a humane man,’ began Peter, ‘and though I don’t like the prickly brute-’

Then he, too, broke off, and Harriet saw his face change. It frightened her. It became the kind of face that might have belonged to that agonised dreamer of the morning hours.

‘What is it, Peter?’

He said in a half whisper: ‘Here we go round the prickly pear, the prickly pear, the prickly pear-’

‘Once the summer is over,’ pursued the vicar, ‘you must administer water very sparingly, very sparingly indeed.’

‘Surely,’ said Harriet, ‘it couldn’t have been the knowledgeable Crutchley.’

‘I think it was,’ said Peter, as though returning to them from a long journey. ‘Harriet-you heard Crutchley tell Kirk how he watered it last Wednesday week and wound the clock before collecting his wages from old Noakes.’

‘Yes.’

‘And the day before yesterday you saw him water it again.’

‘Of course; we all saw him.’

Mr Goodacre was aghast. ‘But, my dear Lady Peter, he couldn’t have done that. The cactus is a desert plant. It only requires watering about once a month in the cooler weather.’

Peter, having emerged to clear up this minor mystery, seemed to be back on his nightmare trail. He muttered: ‘I can’t remember-’

But the vicar took no notice.

‘Somebody has touched it lately,’ he said. ‘I see you’ve put it on a longer chain.’

Peter’s gasp was like a sob.

‘That’s it. The chain. We were all chained together.’

The struggle passed from his face, leaving it empty as a mask. ‘What’s that about a chain, padre?’