Gaudy Night

6

Peter,” said Harriet. And with the sound of her own voice she came drowsing and floating up out of the strong circle of his arms, through a green sea of sun-dappled beech leaves into darkness.

“Oh, damn,” said Harriet softly to herself. “Oh, damn. And I didn’t want to wake up.”

The clock in the New Quad struck three musically.

“This won’t do,” said Harriet. “This really will not do. My subconscious has a most treacherous imagination.” She groped for the switch of her bedside lamp. “It’s disquieting to reflect that one’s dreams never symbolize one’s real wishes, but always something Much Worse.” She turned the light on and sat up.

“If I really wanted to be passionately embraced by Peter, I should dream of something like dentists or gardening. I wonder what are the unthinkable depths of awfulness that can only be expressed by the polite symbol of Peter’s embraces. Damn Peter! I wonder what he would do about a case like this.” This brought her mind back to the evening in the Egotists’ Club and the anonymous letter; and thence back to his absurd fury with the sticking-plaster.

“… but my mind being momentarily on my job…”

You’d think he was quite bird-witted, sometimes, she thought. But he does keep his mind on the job, when he’s doing it. One’s mind on the job. Yes. What am I doing, letting my mind stray all over the place. Is this a job, or isn’t it?… Suppose the Poison-Pen is on its rounds now, dropping letters at people’s doors… Whose door, though? One can’t watch all the doors… I ought to be sitting up at the window, keeping an eye open for creeping figures in the quad… Somebody ought to do it-but who’s to be trusted? Besides, dons have their jobs to do; they can’t sit up all night and work all day… The job… keeping one’s mind on the job…

She was out of bed now and pulling the window curtains aside. There was no moon and nothing at all to be seen. Not even a late essay-writer seemed to be burning the midnight lamp. Anybody could go anywhere on a dark night like this, she thought to herself. She could scarcely see even the outline of the roofs of Tudor on her right or the dark bulk of the New Library jutting out on her left from behind the Annexe.

The Library; with not a soul in it.

She put on a dressing-gown and opened her door softly. It was bitterly cold. She found the wall-switch and went down the central corridor of the Annexe, past a row of doors behind which students were sleeping and dreaming of goodness knew what-examinations, sports, undergraduates, parties, all the queer jumble of things that are summed up as “activities.” Outside their doors lay little heaps of soiled crockery for the scouts to collect and wash. Also shoes. On the doors were cards, bearing their names: Miss H. Brown, Miss Jones, Miss Colburn, Miss Szleposky, Miss Isaacson-so many unknown quantities. So many destined wives and mothers of the race; or, alternatively, so many potential historians, scientists, schoolteachers, doctors, lawyers; as you liked to think one thing of more importance than the other. At the end of the passage was a large window, hygienically open at top and bottom. Harriet gently pushed up the bottom sash and looked out, shivering. And suddenly she knew that whatever reason or instinct had led her to look at the Library had taken a very just view of the situation. The New Library should have been quite dark. It was not. One of the long windows was split from top to bottom by a narrow band of light.

Harriet thought rapidly. If this was Miss Burrows, carrying on legitimately (though at an unreasonable and sacrificial hour) with her preparations, why had she troubled to draw the curtains? The windows had been curtained, because a Library that faces south must have some protection against strong sunlight. But it would be absurd for the Librarian to protect herself and her proper functions from scrutiny in the middle of a dark March night. College authorities were not so secretive as all that. Something was up. Should one go and investigate on one’s own, or rouse somebody else?

One thing was clear; if it was a member of the S.C.R. lurking behind those curtains, it would not be politic to bring a student to witness the discovery. What dons slept in Tudor? Without consulting the list, Harriet remembered that Miss Barton and Miss Chilperic had rooms there, but on the far side of the building. Here was an opportunity to check up on them, at any rate. With a last glance at the Library window, Harriet made her way quickly back past her own room on the Bridge and through into the main building. She cursed herself for not having a torch; she was delayed by fumbling with the switches. Along the corridor, past the stair-head and round to the left. No don on that floor; it must be on the floor below. Back, and down the stairs and along to the left again. She was leaving all the passage-lights burning behind her, and wondered whether they would arouse attention in other buildings. At last. A door on her left labelled “Miss Barton.” And the door stood open.

She knocked at it sharply, and went in. The sitting-room was empty. Beyond it, the bedroom door stood open too. “Gracious! said Harriet. ”Miss Barton!“ There was no reply; and, looking in, she saw that the bedroom was as empty as the sitting-room. The bed-clothes were flung back and the bed had been slept in; but the sleeper had risen and gone.

It was easy to think of an innocent explanation. Harriet stood for a moment, considering; and then called to mind that the window of the room overlooked the quad. The curtains were drawn back; she looked out into the darkness. The light still shone in the Library window; but while she looked, it went out.

She ran back to the foot of the stair and through the entrance-hall. The front door of the building was ajar. She pulled it open and ran out and across the quad. As she ran, something seemed to loom up ahead of her. She made for it and closed with it. It caught her in a muscular grip.

“Who’s that?” demanded Harriet, fiercely.

“And who’s that?”

The grip of one hand was released and a torch was switched on into Harriet’s face.

“Miss Vane! What are you doing here?”

“Is that Miss Barton? I was looking for you. I saw a light in the New Library.”

“So did I. I’ve just been over to investigate. The door’s locked.”

“Locked?”

“And the key inside.”

“Isn’t there another way up?” asked Harriet.

“Yes, of course there is. I ought to have thought of that. Up through the Hall passage and the Fiction Library. Come along!”

“Wait a minute,” said Harriet. “Whoever it is may be still there. You watch the main door, to see they don’t get out that way. I’ll go up through the Hall.”

“Very well. Good idea. Here! haven’t you got a torch? You’d better take mine. You’ll waste time turning on lights.”

Harriet snatched the torch and ran, thinking hard. Miss Barton’s story sounded plausible enough. She had woken up (why?), seen the light (very likely she slept with her curtains drawn open) and gone out to investigate while Harriet was running about the upper floors hunting for the right room. In the meantime, the person in the Library had either finished what she was doing or, possibly, peeped out and been alarmed by seeing the lights go up in Tudor. She had switched out the light. She had not gone out by the main door; she was either still somewhere in the Hall-Library Wing, or she had crept out by the Hall stair while Miss Barton and Harriet were grappling with one another in the quad.

Harriet found the Hall stair and started up it, using her torch as little as possible and keeping the light low. It came forcibly into her mind that the person she was hunting was- must be-unbalanced, if not mad, and might possibly deliver a nasty swipe out of a dark corner. She arrived at the head of the stair, and pushed back the swinging glass double door that led to the passage between the Hall and the Buttery. As she did so, she fancied she heard a slight scuffling sound ahead, and almost simultaneously she saw the gleam of a torch. There ought to be a two-way switch just on the right, behind the door. She found it, and pressed it down. There was a quick flicker, and then darkness. A fuse? Then she laughed at herself. Of course not. The person at the other end of the passage had flicked the switch at the same moment as herself. She pushed the switch up again, and the lights flooded the passage.

On her left, she saw the three doorways, with the serving-hatches between, that led into the Hall. On the right was the long blank wall between the passage and the kitchens. And ahead of her, at the far end of the passage, close to the Buttery door, stood somebody clutching a dressing-gown about her with one hand and a large jug in the other.

Harriet advanced swiftly upon this apparition, which came meekly enough to meet her. Its features seemed familiar, and in a moment she identified them. It was Miss Hudson, the Third Year student who had been up at Gaudy.

“What in the world are you doing here at this time of night?” demanded Harriet, severely. Not that she had any particular right to question students about their movements. Nor did she feel that her own appearance, in pyjamas and a Jaeger dressing-gown, suggested dignity or authority. Miss Hudson, indeed, seemed quite flabbergasted at being thus accosted by a total stranger at three in the morning. She stared, speechless.

“Why shouldn’t I be here?” said Miss Hudson, at last defiantly. “I don’t know who you are. I’ve as much right to walk about as you have… Oh, gosh!” she added, and burst out laughing. “I suppose you’re one of the scouts. I didn’t recognize you without your uniform.”

“No,” said Harriet “I’m an old student. You’re Miss Hudson, aren’t you! But your room isn’t here. Have you been along to the Buttery?” Her eyes were on the jug; Miss Hudson blushed.

“Yes-I wanted some milk. I’ve got an essay.”

She spoke of it as though it were a disease. Harriet chuckled.

“So that still goes on, does it? Carrie’s just as soft-hearted as Agnes was in my day.” She went up to the Buttery hatch and shook it, but it was locked. “No, apparently she isn’t.”

“I asked her to leave it open,” said Miss Hudson, “but I expect she forgot. I say-don’t give Carrie away. She’s awfully decent.”

“You know quite well that Carrie isn’t supposed to leave the hatch open. You ought to get your milk before ten o’clock.”

“I know. But one doesn’t always know if one will want it. You’ve done the same thing in your time, I expect.”

“Yes,” said Harriet. “Well, you’d better cut along. Wait a second. When did you come up here?”

“Just now. Just a few seconds before you did.”

“Did you meet anybody?”

“No,” Miss Hudson looked alarmed. “Why? Has anything happened?”

“Not that I know of. Get along to bed.”

Miss Hudson escaped and Harriet tried the Buttery door which was as firmly locked as the hatch. Then she went on, through the Fiction Library, which was empty, and put her hand on the handle of the oak door that led to the New Library. The door was immovable. There was no key in the lock. Harriet looked round the Fiction Library. On the window-sill lay a thin pencil, beside a book and a few papers. She pushed the pencil into the key-hole; it encountered no resistance.

She went to the window of the Fiction Library and pushed it up. It looked on to the roof of a small loggia. Two people were not enough for this game of hide-and-seek. She pulled a table across the Library door, so that if anybody tried to come out that way behind her back she should have notice of it; then she climbed out on to the loggia roof and leaned over the balcony. She could see nothing distinctly beneath her, but she pulled her torch from her pocket and signalled with it.

“Hullo!” said Miss Barton’s voice, cautiously, from below.

“The other door’s locked, and the key gone.”

“That’s awkward. If either of us goes, somebody may come out. And if we yell for help there’ll be an uproar.”

“That’s about the size of it,” said Harriet.

“Well, listen; I’ll try and get in through one of the ground floor windows They all seem to be latched, but I might break a pane of glass.”

Harriet waited. Presently she heard a faint tinkle. Then there was a pause and presently the sound of a moving sash. There was a longer pause. Harriet came back into the Fiction Library and pulled the table away from the door. In about six or seven minutes’ time she saw the door handle move and heard a tap on the other side of the oak. She stooped to the key-hole, and called “What’s up?” and bent her ear to listen. “Nobody here,” said Miss Barton’s voice on the other side. “Keys gone. And the most ghastly mess-up.”

“I’ll come round.”

She hurried back through the Hall and round to the front of the Library Here she found the window that Miss Barton had opened, climbed through and ran on up the stairs into the Library.

“Well!”, said Harriet.

The New Library was a handsome, lofty room, with six bays on the South side, lit by as many windows running nearly from the floor to the ceiling. On the North side, the wall was windowless, and shelved to a height of ten feet. Above this was a space of blank wall, along which it would be possible, at some future time, to run an extra gallery when the books should become too many for the existent shelving. This blank space had been adorned by Miss Burrows and her party with a series of engravings, such as every academic community possesses, representing the Parthenon, the Colosseum, Trajan’s Column and other topographical and classical subjects.

All the books in the room had been dragged out and flung on the floor, by the simple expedient of removing the shelves bodily. The pictures had been thrown down. And the blank wall space thus exposed had been adorned with a frieze of drawings, roughly executed in brown paint, and with inscriptions in letters a foot high, all of the most unseemly sort. A pair of library steps and a pot of paint with a wide brush in it stood triumphantly in the midst of the wreckage, to show how the transformation had been accomplished.

“That’s torn it,” said Harriet.

“Yes,” said Miss Barton. “A very nice reception for Lord Oakapple.” There was an odd note in her voice-almost of satisfaction. Harriet looked sharply at her.

“What are you going to do? What does one do? Go over the place with a magnifying glass? or send for the police?”

“Neither,” said Harriet. She considered for a moment.

“The first thing,” she said, “is to send for the Dean. The next is to find either the original keys or a spare set. The third, is to clean off these filthy inscriptions before anybody sees them. And the fourth is to get the room straight before twelve o’clock. There’s plenty of time. Will you be good enough to wake the Dean and bring her with you. In the meantime, I’ll have a look round for clues. We can discuss afterwards who did the job and how she got out. Please make haste.”

“H’m!” said the Fellow. “I like people who know their own minds.” She went with surprising promptness.

“Her dressing-gown is all over paint,” said Harriet aloud to herself, “but she may have got it climbing in.” She went downstairs and examined the open window. “Yes, here’s where she scrambled over the wet radiator. I expect I’m marked too. Yes, I am. Nothing to show whether it all came from there. Damp footmarks-hers and mine, no doubt. Wait a moment.”

She traced the damp marks up to the top of the stairs, where they grew faint and ceased. She could find no third set; but the footmarks of the intruder would probably have had time to dry. Whoever it was must have begun operations very soon after midnight at latest. The paint had splashed about a good deal; if it were possible to search the whole college for paint-stained clothing, well and good. But it would cause a terrific scandal. Miss Hudson-had she shown any marks of paint anywhere? Harriet thought not. She looked about her again, and realized unexpectedly that she had the lights full on, and that the curtains were drawn open. If anybody was looking across from one of the other buildings, the interior of the room would show up like a lighted stage. She snapped the lights off, and drew the curtains again carefully before putting them on again.

“Yes,” she said. “I see. That was the idea. The curtains were drawn while the job was done. Then the lights were turned off and the curtains opened. Then the artist escaped, leaving the doors locked. In the morning, everything would look quite ordinary from the outside. Who would have been the first to try and come in? An early scout, to do a final clean-round? She would find the door locked, think Miss Burrows had left it like that, and probably do nothing about it. Miss Burrows would probably have come up first. When? A little after Chapel, or a little before. She would not have been able to get in. Time would have been wasted hunting for the keys. When anybody did get in, it would have been two late to straighten things up. Everybody would have been about. The Chancellor-?”

Miss Burrows would have been the first to come up. She had also been the last to leave, and was the person who knew best where the paint pots had been put. Would she have wrecked her own job, any more than Miss Lydgate would have wrecked her own proofs? How far was that psychological premise sound? One would surely damage anything in the world, except one’s own work. But on the other hand, if one were cunning enough to see that people would think exactly that, then one would promptly take the precaution of seeing that one’s own work did suffer.

Harriet moved slowly about the Library. There was a big splash of paint on the parquet. And at the edge of it-oh, yes! it would be very useful to hunt the place over for paint-stained clothes. But here was evidence that the culprit had worn no slippers. Why should she have worn anything? The radiators on this floor were working at full blast, and a complete absence of clothing would be not merely politic out comfortable.

And how had the person got away? Neither Miss Hudson (if she was to be trusted) nor Harriet had met anyone on the way up. But there had been plenty of time for escape, after the lights were put out. A stealthy figure creeping away under the Hall archway could not have been seen from the far side of the Old Quad. Or, if it came to that, there might quite well have been somebody lurking in the Hall while Harriet and Miss Hudson were talking in the passage.

“I’ve mucked it a bit,” said Harriet. “I ought to have turned on the Hall lights to make sure.”

Miss Barton re-entered with the Dean, who took one look round and said “Mercy!” She looked like a stout little mandarin, with her long red pigtail and quilted blue dressing-gown sprawled over with green-and-scarlet dragons. “What idiots we were not to expect it. Of course, the obvious thing! If we’d only thought about it, Miss Burrows could have locked up before she went. And what do we do now?”

“My first reaction,” said Harriet, “is turpentine. And the second is Padgett.”

“My dear, you are perfectly right. Padgett will cope. He always does. Like charity, he never fails. What a mercy you people spotted what was going on. As soon as we get these disgusting inscriptions cleaned off, we can put on a coat of quick-drying distemper or something, or paper the wall over and-goodness! I don’t know where the turpentine will come from unless the painters have left a lot. It’ll need a young bath. But Padgett will manage.”

“I’ll run over and get him,” said Harriet “and at the same time I’ll collar Miss Burrows. We’ll have to get these books back into place. What’s the time? Five to four. I think it can be done all right. Will you hold the fort till I come back?”

“Yes. Oh, and you’ll find the main door open now. I had an extra key, fortunately. A beautiful plated key-all ready for Lord Oakapple. But we’ll have to get a locksmith to the other door, unless the builders have a spare.”

The most remarkable thing about that remarkable morning was the imperturbability of Padgett. He answered Harriet’s summons attired in a handsome pair of striped pyjamas, and received her instructions with monumental stolidity.

“The Dean is sorry to say, Padgett, that somebody has been playing some very disagreeable tricks in the New Library.”

“Have they indeed, miss?”

“The whole place has been turned upside down, and some very vulgar words and pictures scrawled on the wall.”

“Very unfortunate, miss, that is.”

“In brown paint.”

“That’s awkward, miss.”

“It will have to be cleaned at once, before anybody sees it.”

“Very good, miss.”

“And then we shall have to get hold of the decorators or somebody to paper or wash it over before the Chancellor arrives.”

“Very good, miss.”

“Do you think you can manage it, Padgett?”

“Just you leave it to me, miss.”

Harriet’s next job was to collect Miss Burrows, who received the news with loud expressions of annoyance.

“How loathsome! And do you mean to say all those books have got to be done again? Now? Oh, lord, yes-I suppose there’s no help for it. What a blessing I hadn’t put the Folio Chaucer and the other valuables in the show-cases. Lord!”

The Librarian scrambled out of bed. Harriet looked at her feet. They were quite clean. But there was an odd smell in the bedroom. She traced it after a moment or two to the neighborhood of the permanent basin.

“I say-is that turps?”.

“Yes,” replied Miss Burrows, struggling into her stockings. “I brought it across from the library. I got paint on my hands when I moved those pots and things.”

“I wish you’d lend it me. We had to scramble in through the window over a wet radiator.”

“Yes, rather.”

Harriet went out, puzzled. Why should Miss Burrows have bothered to bring the can over to the New Quad, when she could have cleaned off the paint on the spot? But, she could well understand that if anyone had wanted to remove paint from her feet after being disturbed in the middle of a piece of to work, there might have been nothing for it but to snatch up the can and bolt for it.

Then she had another idea. The culprit could not have left the Library with her feet bare. She would have put on her slippers again. If you put paint-stained feet into slippers, the slippers ought to show signs of it.

She went back to her own room and dressed. Then she returned to the New Quad. Miss Burrows had gone. Her bedroom slippers lay by the bed. Harriet examined them minutely, inside and out, but they were quite free from paint. On her way back again, Harriet overtook Padgett. He was walking sedately across the lawn, carrying a large can of turpentine in each hand.

“Where did you rake that up, Padgett, so early in the morning?”

“Well, miss, Mullins went on his motor-bike and knocked up a chap he knows what lives over his own oil-shop, miss.”

As simple as that.

Some time later, Harriet and the Dean, decorously robed and gowned, found themselves passing along the East side of Queen Elizabeth Building in the wake of Padgett and the decorators’ foreman.

“Young ladies,” Padgett was heard to say, “will ’ave their larks, same as young gentlemen.”

“When I was a lad,” replied the foreman, “young ladies was young ladies. And young gentlemen was young gentlemen. If you get my meaning.”

“Wot this country wants,” said Padgett, “is a ’Itler.”

“That’s right,” said the foreman. “Keep the girls at ’ome. Funny kind o’ job you got ’ere, mate. Wot was you, afore you took to keepin’ a ’en ’ouse?”

“Assistant camel ’and at the Zoo. Very interesting job it was, too.”

“Wot made you chuck it?”

“Blood-poison. I was bit in the arm,” said Padgett “by a female.”

“Ah!” said the foreman decorator.

By the time Lord Oakapple arrived, the Library presented nothing unseemly to the eye, beyond a certain dampness and streakiness in its upper parts, where the new paper was drying unevenly. The glass had been swept up and the paint stains cleaned from the floor; twenty photographs of classical statuary had been unearthed from a store-cupboard to replace the Colosseum and the Parthenon; the books were back on their shelves, and the showcases duly displayed the Chaucer Folio, the Shakespeare First Quarto, the three Kelmscott Morrises, the autographed copy of The Man of Property, and the embroidered glove belonging to the Countess of Shrewsbury. The Dean hovered about the Chancellor like a hen with one chick, in a martyrdom of nervous apprehension lest some indelicate missive should drop from his table-napkin or flutter out unexpectedly from the folds of his robes; and when, in the Senior Common Room after lunch, he took out a bunch of notes from his pocket and riffled them over with a puzzled frown, the tension became so acute that she nearly dropped the sugar-basin. It turned out, however, that he had merely mislaid a Greek quotation. The Warden, though the history of the Library was known to her, displayed her usual serene poise.

Harriet saw nothing of all this. She spent the whole interval, after the decorators had done their part, in the Library, watching the movements of everyone who came in or out, and seeing that they left nothing undesirable behind them. Apparently, however, the College Poltergeist had shot its bolt. A cold lunch was brought up to the self-appointed invigilator. A napkin covered it; but nothing lurked beneath its folds beyond a plate of ham sandwiches and other such harmless matter. Harriet recognized the scout.

“It’s Annie, isn’t it? Are you on the kitchen staff now?”

“No, madam. I wait upon the Hall and Senior Common Room.”

“How are your little girls getting on? I think Miss Lydgate said you had two little girls?”

“Yes, madam. How kind of you to ask.” Annie’s face beamed with pleasure. “They’re splendid. Oxford suits them, after living in a manufacturing town, where we were before. Are you fond of children, madam?”

“Oh, yes,” said Harriet. Actually, she did not care much about children-but one can scarcely say so, bluntly, to those possessed of these blessings. “You ought to be married and have some of your own, madam. There! I oughtn’t to have said that-it’s not my place. But it seems to me a dreadful thing to see all these unmarried ladies living together. It isn’t natural, is it?”

“Well, Annie, it’s all according to taste. And one has to wait for the right person to come along.”

“That’s very true, madam.” Harriet suddenly recollected that Annie’s husband had been queer, or committed suicide, or something unfortunate, and wondered whether her commonplace had been a tactful one. But Annie seemed quite pleased with it. She smiled again; she had large, light blue eyes, and Harriet thought she must have been a good-looking woman before she got so thin and worried-looking. “I’m sure I hope he’ll come along for you-or perhaps you are engaged to be married?”

Harriet frowned. She had no particular liking for the question, and did not want to discuss her private affairs with the college servants. But there seemed to be no impertinent intention behind the inquiry, so she answered Pleasantly, “Not just yet; but you never know. How do you like the new Library?”

“It’s a very handsome room, isn’t it madam? But it seems a great shame to keep up this big place just for women to study books in. I can’t see what girls want with books. Books won’t teach them to be good wives.”

“What dreadful opinions!” said Harriet. “Whatever made you take a job in a women’s college, Annie?”

The scout’s face clouded. “Well, madam, I’ve had my misfortunes. I was glad to take what I could get.”

“Yes, of course; I was only joking. Do you like the work?”

“It’s quite all right. But some of these clever ladies are a bit queer, don’t you think, madam? Funny, I mean. No heart in them.”

Harriet remembered that there had been misunderstandings with Miss Hillyard.

“Oh, no,” she said briskly. “Of course they are very busy people, and haven’t much time for outside interests. But they are all very kind.”

“Yes, madam; I’m sure they mean to be. But I always think of what it says in the Bible, about ‘much learning hath made thee mad.’ It isn’t a right thing.”

Harriet looked up sharply and caught an odd look in the scout’s eyes. “What do you mean by that, Annie?”

“Nothing at all, madam. Only funny things go on sometimes, but of course, being a visitor, you wouldn’t know, and it’s not my place to mention them-being only a servant, nowadays.”

“I certainly,” said Harriet, rather alarmed, “wouldn’t mention anything of the kind you suggest to outside people or visitors. If you have any complaint to make, you should speak to the Bursar, or the Warden.”

“I haven’t any complaint, madam. But you may have heard about rude words being written up on the walls, and about the things that were burnt in the Quad-why, there was a bit in the papers about that. Well, you’ll find, madam they all happened since a certain person came into the college.”

“What person?” said Harriet sternly.

“One of these learned ladies, madam. Well, perhaps I’d better not say anything more about that. You write detective books, don’t you, madam? Well you’ll find something in that lady’s past, you may be sure of it. At least that’s what a good many people are saying. And it isn’t a nice thing for anybody to be in the same place with a woman like that.”

“I feel quite sure you must be mistaken, Annie; I should be very careful how you spread about a tale of that kind. You’d better run along back to the Hall, now; I expect they’ll be needing you.”

So that was what the servants were saying. Miss de Vine, of course; she was the “learned lady” whose arrival had coincided with the beginning of the disturbances-coincided more exactly than Annie could know, unless she too had seen that drawing in the quad at the Gaudy. A curious woman, Miss de Vine, and undoubtedly with a varied experience behind those disconcerting eyes. But Harriet was inclined to like her, and she certainly did not look mad in the way that the “Poison-Pen” was mad; though it would not be surprising to learn that she had a streak of fanaticism somewhere. What, by the way, had she been doing the previous night? She had rooms at the moment in Queen Elizabeth; there was probably little likelihood of proving an alibi for her now. Miss de Vine-well! she would have to be put on the same footing as everybody else.

The opening of the Library took place without a hitch. The Chancellor unlocked the main door with the plated key, unaware that the same key had opened it, under curious circumstances, the night before. Harriet watched, carefully the faces of the assembled dons and scouts; none of them showed any sign of surprise, anger or disappointment at the decorous appearance of the Library. Miss Hudson was present looking cheerfully unconcerned; Miss Cattermole, too, was there. She looked as though she had been crying; and Harriet noticed that she stood in a corner by herself and talked to nobody until, at the conclusion of the ceremony, a dark girl in spectacles made her way through the crowd to her and they walked away together.

Later in the day, Harriet went to the Warden to make her promised report. She pointed out the difficulty of dealing with an outbreak like that of the previous night single-handed. A careful patrol of the quads and passages by a number of helpers would probably have resulted in the capture of the culprit; and the whole of the suspects could in any case have been checked up at an early moment. She strongly advised enlisting some women from Miss Climpson’s Agency, the nature of which she explained.

“I see the point,” replied the Warden; “but I find that at least two members of the Senior Common Room feel very strong objections to that course of action.”

“I know,” said Harriet. “Miss Allison and Miss Barton. Why?”

“I think, too,” pursued the Warden, without answering this question, “that the matter presents certain difficulties. What would the students think of these strangers prowling about the college at night? They will wonder why police duties cannot be undertaken by ourselves, and we can hardly inform them that we ourselves are particularly under suspicion. And to perform such duties as you suggest, properly, quite a large number would be required-if all the strategic points are to be held. Then these persons would be quite ignorant of the conditions of college life, and might easily make unfortunate mistakes by following and questioning the wrong people. I do not see how we could avoid a very unpleasant scandal and some complaints.”

“I see all that. Warden. But all the same, that is the quickest solution.”

The Warden bent her head over a handsome piece of tapestry-work on which she was engaged. “I cannot feel it to be very desirable. I know you will say that the whole situation is undesirable. I quite agree with you.” She looked up. “I suppose, Miss Vane, you could not yourself spare the time to assist us?”

“I could spare the time,” said Harriet, slowly. “But without help it is going to be very difficult. If there were only one or two people who were exonerated without a shadow of doubt, it would be very much easier.”

“Miss Barton assisted you very ably last night.”

“Yes,” said Harriet; “but-how shall I put it? If I were writing a story about this, the person first on the spot would be the first person to be suspected.” The Warden selected an orange skein from her basket and threaded her needle deliberately.

“Will you explain that, please?”

Harriet explained carefully.

“That is very clearly put,” said Dr. Baring. “I understand perfectly. Now, about this student, Miss Hudson. Her explanation does not seem to be satisfactory. She could not possibly have expected to get food from the Buttery at that hour; and in fact, she did not.”

“No,” said Harriet; “but I know quite well that in my day it wasn’t too difficult to get round the right side of the Head Scout to leave the hatch open all night. Then, if one had a late essay or anything and felt hungry, one went down and got what one wanted.”

“Dear me,” said the Warden.

“We were always quite honourable about it,” said Harriet, “and entered it all on the slate, so that it figured in our battels at the end of term. Though,” she added thoughtfully, “there were some items of cold meat and dripping that must have been camouflaged a bit. Still-I think Miss Hudson’s explanation will pass muster.”

“Actually, the hatch was locked.”

“Actually, it was. As a matter of fact, I have seen Carrie, and she assures me that it was locked at 10:30 last night as usual. She admits that Miss Hudson asked her to leave it open, but says she didn’t do so, because, only last night, the Bursar had given special instructions about the locking of the hatch and Buttery. That would be after the meeting, no doubt. She also says she has been more particular this term than she used to be, because of a little trouble there was over the same thing last term.”

“Well-I see there is no proof against Miss Hudson. I believe she is rather a lively young woman, however; so it may be as well to keep an eye on her. She is very able; but her antecedents are not particularly refined, and I dare say, it is possible that she might look upon even the disagreeable expressions found in the-er-the communications in the light of a joke. I tell you this, not to create any prejudice against the girl, but merely for whatever evidential value it may possess.”

“Thank you. Well, then. Warden; if you feel it is impossible to call in outside help, I suggest that I should stay in College for a week or so, ostensibly to help Miss Lydgate with her book and to do some research on my own account in Bodley. I could then make a few more investigations. If nothing decisive results by the end of the term, I really think the question of engaging professionals will have to be faced.”

“That is a very generous offer,” said the Warden. “We shall all be exceedingly grateful to you.”

“I ought to warn you,” said Harriet, “that one or two of the Senior Members do not approve of me.”

“That may make it a little more difficult. But if you are ready to put up with that unpleasantness in the interests of the College, it can only increase our sense of gratitude. I cannot too strongly emphasize how exceedingly important it is to avoid publicity. Nothing is more prejudicial to the College in particular and to University women in general than spiteful and ill-informed gossip in the press, The students, so far, seem to have been very loyal. If any of them had been indiscreet we should certainly have heard of it by now.”

“How about Miss Flaxman’s young man at New College?”

“Both he and Miss Flaxman have behaved quite well. At first, naturally, it was taken to be a purely personal matter. When the situation developed, I spoke to Miss Flaxman, and received her assurance that she and her fiancé would keep the whole thing to themselves until it could be properly cleared up.”

“I see,” said Harriet. “Well, we must do what we can. One thing I should like to suggest, and that is that some of the passage-lights should be left on at night. It is difficult enough to patrol a large set of buildings in the light: in the dark, it is impossible.”

“That is reasonable,” replied Dr. Baring. “I will speak to the Bursar about it.”

And with this unsatisfactory arrangement, Harriet was obliged to be content.