The Literary Lord Peter

 

CHAPTER XIV

 

Crowner's Quest

 

 

Love? Do I love? I walk

Within the brilliance of another's thought,

As in a glory. I was dark before,

As Venus' chapel in the black of night:

But there was something holy in the darkness,

Softer and not so thick as other where;

And as rich moonlight may be to the blind,

Unconsciously consoling. Then love came,

Like the out-bursting of a trodden star.

 

Thomas Lovell Beddoes : The Second Brother

 

 

The coroner did not, after all, confine himself to taking evidence of identity; but he showed a laudable discretion in handling his witnesses. Miss Twitterton, in a brand-new black frock, a perky little close-fitting hat and a black coat of old-fashioned cut, clearly resurrected for the occasion, testified, with sniffs, that the body was that of her uncle, William Noakes, and that she had not seen him since the last Sunday week. She explained her uncle's habit of dividing his time between Broxford and Paggleham, and about the two sets of keys. Her endeavours to explain also about the sale of the house and the astonishing financial situation disclosed were kindly but firmly cut short, and Lord Peter Wimsey, in act more graceful, took her place and gave a brief and rather nonchalant résumé of his surprising wedding-night experiences. He handed the coroner various papers concerning the purchase of the house and sat down amid a murmur of sympathetic comment. Then came an accountant from Broxford, with a statement about the moribund condition of the wireless business, as revealed by a preliminary examination of the books. Mervyn Bunter, in well-chosen language, recounted the visit of the sweep and the subsequent discovery of the body. Dr. Craven spoke to the cause and probable time of death, described the injuries, and gave it as his opinion that they could not have been self-inflicted or produced by an accidental fall.

 

Next, Joe Sellon, very white in the face, but in official control of himself. He said he had been summoned to see the dead body, and described how it lay in the cellar.

 

"You are the village constable?"

 

"Yes, sir."

 

"When did you last see the deceased alive?"

 

"On the Wednesday night, sir, at five minutes past nine."

 

"Will you tell us about that?"

 

"Yes, sir. I had a certain matter of a private nature to discuss with the deceased. I proceeded to the house and spoke to him at the sitting-room window for about ten minutes."

 

"Did he then seem just as usual?"

 

"Yes, sir; except that words passed between us and he was a little excited. When we had finished our conversation he shut and bolted the window. I tried both doors and found them locked. I then went away."

 

"You did not enter the house?"

 

"No, sir."

 

"And you left him at 9.15 p.m., alive and well?"

 

"Yes, sir."

 

"Very well."

 

Joe Sellon turned to go; but the lugubrious man whom Bunter had met in the pub rose up from among the jury and said:

 

"We should like to ask the witness, Mr. Perkins, what he had words with the deceased about."

 

"You hear," said the coroner, slightly put out. "The jury wish to know the cause of your dispute with the deceased."

 

"Yes, sir. The deceased threatened to report me for a breach of duty."

 

"Ah!" said the coroner. "Well, we are not here to examine into your official conduct. It was he that threatened you, not you that threatened him?"

 

"That's right, sir; though I admit I was annoyed and spoke a bit sharp to him."

 

"I see. You did not return to the house that night?"

 

"No, sir."

 

"Very well; that will do. Superintendent Kirk."

 

The little stir of excitement aroused by Sellon's evidence died down before the enormous impassivity of Mr. Kirk, who described, very slowly and at considerable length, the arrangement of the rooms in the house, the nature of the fastenings on the doors and windows and the difficulty of ascertaining the facts due to the (quite fortuitous though very unfortunate) disturbance caused by the arrival of the new occupiers. The next witness was Martha Ruddle. She was in a great state of excitement, and almost excessively ready to assist the law. It was, indeed, her own readiness that undid her.

 

"...that taken aback," said Mrs. Ruddle, "you could a-knocked me down with a feather. Driving up to the door in the middle of the night as you might say, in sech a big motor-car as I never did see in all my born days, not without it was on the picturs—— Lord what? I says, not believing him, which I'm sure, sir, it ain't surprising, more like film-stars I says, begging your pardon, and of course I were mistook, but that there car being so big and the lady in a fur coat and the gentleman with a glass in his eye jest like Ralph Lynn, which was all I could see in the——"

 

Peter turned the monocle on the witness with so outraged an astonishment that the giggles turned to loud laughter.

 

"Kindly keep to the question," said Mr. Perkins, vexed; "you were surprised to hear that the house was sold. Very well. We have heard how you got in. Will you please describe the condition of the house as you observed it."

 

From a tangle of irrelevancies, the coroner disengaged the facts that the bed had not been slept in, that the supper things were on the table, and that the cellar-door had been found open. With a weary sigh (for his cold was a severe one and he wanted to finish and get home), he took the witness back to the events of the preceding Wednesday.

 

"Yes," said Mrs. Ruddle, "I did see Joe Sellon, and a nice sorter pleeceman 'e is, usin' language not fit for a respectable woman to listen to, I don't wonder Mr. Noakes shet the winder in 'is face...."

 

"You saw him do that?"

 

"Plain as the nose on your face, I see 'im. Standin' there 'e was with the candlestick in 'is 'and, same as I couldn't miss seein' 'im, and laffin' fit to bust, and well 'e might, 'earin' Joe Sellon carryin' on that ridiculous. Well, I says to meself, a nice pleeceman you are, Joe Sellon, and I oughter know it, seein' you 'ad ter come ter me to find out 'oo took them 'ens of Miss Twitterton's...."

 

"We are not inquiring into that," began the coroner, when the lugubrious man again rose up and said:

 

"The jury would like to know whether the witness heard what the quarrel was about."

 

"Yes, I did," said the witness, without waiting for the coroner. "They was quarrellin' about 'is wife, that's what they was quarrellin' about, and I say it's a——"

 

"Whose wife?" asked the coroner; while the whole room rustled with expectation.

 

"Joe's wife, o'course," said Mrs. Ruddle. "What 'ave you done wi' my wife, you old villain, 'e says, usin' names wot I wouldn't put me tongue to."

 

Joe Sellon sprang to his feet.

 

"That's a lie, sir!"

 

"Now, Joe," said Kirk.

 

"We'll hear you in a moment," said Mr. Perkins. "Now, Mrs. Ruddle. You're sure you heard those words?"

 

"The bad words, sir?"

 

"The words, 'What have you done with my wife'?"

 

"Oh, yes, sir—I heard that, sir."

 

"Did any threats pass?"

 

"N'no, sir," admitted Mrs. Ruddle, regretfully, "only sayin' as Mr. Noakes was bound for the bad place, sir."

 

"Quite so. No suggestions about how he was likely to get there?"

 

"Sir?"

 

"No mention of killing or murder?"

 

"Not as I 'eard, sir, but I wouldn't be surprised if 'e did offer to kill Mr. Noakes. Not a bit, I wouldn't."

 

"But actually you heard nothing of the sort?"

 

"Well, I couldn't rightly say I did, sir."

 

"And Mr. Noakes was alive and well when he shut the window?"

 

"Yes, sir."

 

Kirk leaned across the table and spoke to the coroner, who asked:

 

"Did you hear anything further?"

 

"I didn't want to 'ear nothing further, sir. All I 'eard was that Joe Sellon a-'ammerin' on the door."

 

"Did you hear Mr. Noakes let him in?"

 

"Let 'im in?" cried Mrs. Ruddle. "Wot 'ud Mr. Noakes want ter be lettin' 'im in for? Mr. Noakes wouldn't let nobody in wot used language to 'im like wot Joe used. 'E was a terrible timid man, was Mr. Noakes."

 

"I see. And the next morning you came to the house and got no answer?"

 

"That's right. And I says, lor', I says, Mr. Noakes must a-gone over to Broxford...."

 

"Yes; you told us that before. And although you had heard all this terrible quarrel the night before, it never occurred to you that anything might have happened to Mr. Noakes?"

 

"Well, no, I didn't. I thought 'e'd gone off to Broxford, same as 'e often did...."

 

"Quite. In fact, until Mr. Noakes was found dead, you thought nothing of this quarrel and attached no importance to it?"

 

"Well," said Mrs. Ruddle, "only w'en I knowed as 'e must a-died afore 'ar-pas'-nine."

 

"How did you know that?"

 

Mrs. Ruddle, with many circumlocutions, embarked upon the story of the wireless. Peter Wimsey wrote a few lines on a scrap of paper, which he folded and passed to Kirk. The Superintendent nodded, and passed it on to the coroner, who, at the conclusion of the story, asked:

 

"Wireless was Mr. Noakes's business?"

 

"Oh, yes, sir?"

 

"If anything had gone wrong with the set, could he have put it right?"

 

"Oh, yes, sir. 'E was very clever with them things."

 

"But he only cared to listen to the news-bulletin?"

 

"That's right, sir."

 

"What time did he usually go to bed?"

 

"Eleven o'clock, sir. Reg'lar as clockwork 'e was, supper at 'ar-pas'-seven, noos at 'ar-pas'-nine, bed at eleven, w'en 'e wos at 'ome, that is."

 

"Quite. How did you come to be near enough at half past nine to know whether the wireless was on?"

 

Mrs. Ruddle hesitated.

 

"I jest stepped over to the shed, sir."

 

"Yes?"

 

"Jest ter fetch something, sir."

 

"Yes?"

 

"Only a mite o' paraffin, sir," said Mrs. Ruddle, "which I'd a-put it back faithful in the morning, sir."

 

"Ah, yes. Well, that's none of our business. Thank you. Now, Joseph Sellon—you want to make a further statement?"

 

"Yes, sir. Only this, sir. Them words about Mrs. Sellon wasn't never mentioned at all. I might a-said, 'Now, don't you report me, sir, or I'll be in trouble, and what'll become of my wife?' That's all, sir."

 

"The deceased never interfered with your wife in any way?"

 

"No, sir. Certainly not, sir."

 

"I think I had better ask you whether the last witness bears you any grudge, to your knowledge."

 

"Well, sir, about them 'ens o' Miss Twitterton's. In the execution of my duty I 'ad to interrogate 'er son Albert, and I think she took it amiss, sir."

 

"I see. I think that's—— Yes, Superintendent?"

 

Mr. Kirk had just received another message from his noble colleague. It appeared to perplex him; but he faithfully put the question.

 

"Well," said Mr. Perkins, "I should have thought you could have asked him yourself. However. The Superintendent wishes to know the length of the candle deceased had in his hand when he came to the window."

 

Joe Sellon stared.

 

"I don't know, sir," he said, finally. "I never noticed. I don't think it was special one way or the other."

 

The coroner turned interrogatively to Kirk, who, not knowing what was behind the question, shook his head.

 

Mr. Perkins, blowing his nose irritably, dismissed the witness and turned to the jury.

 

"Well, gentlemen, I don't see that we can finish this inquiry to-day. You see that it is impossible to fix the exact moment when deceased met his death, since he may have been prevented from hearing the news-bulletin by a temporary defect in the wireless apparatus, which he may have subsequently repaired. You have heard that the police are in a considerable difficulty as regards the collecting of evidence, since (by a most unfortunate accident for which nobody is at all to blame) various possible clues were destroyed. I understand that the police would like an adjournment—is that so?"

 

Kirk said that it was so; and the coroner adjourned the inquiry to that day fortnight, thus putting a tame end to a very promising affair.

 

As the audience scrambled from the little court, Kirk caught Peter.

 

"That old catamaran!" he said, angrily. "Mr. Perkins came down pretty sharp on her, but if he'd listened to me, he wouldn't have taken any evidence, only to identity."

 

"You think that would have been wise? To let her put her story all round the village, and everybody saying you didn't dare to let it come out at the inquest? He did at least give her the opportunity for an open display of spite. I think he's done better for you than you realise."

 

"Maybe you're right, my lord. I didn't see it that way. What was the point about that candle?"

 

"I wondered how much he really did remember. If he's not sure about the candle, he may only have imagined the clock."

 

"That's so," said Kirk, slowly. He was not sure about the implications of this. Nor, to tell the truth, was Wimsey.

 

"He might," Harriet suggested softly in her husband's ear, "have lied about the time."

 

"So he might. The queer thing is that he didn't. Mrs. Ruddle's clock said the same."

 

"Hawkshaw the Detective, in Who Put Back the Clock?"

 

"Here!" said Kirk, exasperated; "look at that!"

 

Peter looked. Mrs. Ruddle, on the doorstep, was holding a kind of court among the reporters.

 

"Goodness!" said Harriet. "Peter, can't you take them away? Who was the chap who leapt into the gulf?"

 

"Rome prizes most her citizens——"

 

"But every Englishman loves a lord. That's the idea."

 

"My wife," said Peter mournfully, "would cheerfully throw me to the lions, if required. Moriturus—very well, we'll try."

 

He advanced resolutely on the group. Mr. Puncheon, seeing this noble prey at his mercy, unprotected by fat bulls of Basan, flung himself upon him with a gleeful cry. The other hounds closed in about them.

 

"I say," said a grumbling voice close by, "I ought to 'ave given evidence. The law ought to know about them forty quid. Trying to 'ush it up, that's what they are."

 

"I don't suppose it seems so important to them, Frank."

 

"It's important to me. 'Sides, didn't 'e tell me as 'e was goin' to pay me on Wednesday? I reckon the coroner ought to a-been told about it."

 

Salcombe Hardy, having had his chance with Peter, had not abandoned his hold on Mrs. Ruddle. Mischievously, Harriet determined to pry him loose.

 

"Mr. Hardy—if you want an inside story, you'd better get hold of the gardener, Frank Crutchley. There he is, over there, talking to Miss Twitterton. He wasn't called at the inquest, so the others may not realise he's got anything to tell them."

 

Sally bubbled over with gratitude.

 

"If you make it worth his while," said Harriet, with serpent malice, "he might keep it exclusive."

 

"Thanks very much," said Sally, "for the tip."

 

"That's part of our bargain," said Harriet, beaming upon him. Mr. Hardy was rapidly coming to the conclusion that Peter had married a most fascinating woman. He made a rapid dart at Crutchley and in a few moments was seen to depart with him in the direction of the Four-Ale bar. Mrs. Ruddle, suddenly deserted, gazed indignantly about her.

 

"Oh, there you are, Mrs. Ruddle! Where's Bunter? We'd better let him drive us home and come back for his lordship, or we shall get no lunch. I'm simply starving. What an impertinent, tiresome lot these newspaper men are!"

 

"That's right, m'lady," said Mrs. Ruddle. "I wouldn't talk to the likes of them!"

 

She tossed her head, setting some curious jet ornaments on her bonnet jingling, and followed her mistress to the car. Sitting up in all that grandeur she would feel just like a film-star herself. Reporters, indeed!

 

As they drove away, six cameras clicked.

 

"There now," said Harriet. "You'll be in all the papers."

 

"Well, to be sure!" said Mrs. Ruddle.

 

 

"Peter."

 

"Madam?"

 

"Funny, after what we said, that suggestion cropping up about Mrs. Sellon."

 

"Village matron instead of village maiden. Yes; very odd."

 

"There can't be anything in it?"

 

"You never know."

 

"You didn't think so when you said it?"

 

"I am always trying to say something too silly to be believed; but I never manage it. Have another cutlet?"

 

"Thanks, I will. Bunter cooks like an angel in the house. I thought Sellon got through his examination surprisingly well."

 

"Nothing like telling the exact official truth and no more. Kirk must have coached him pretty thoroughly. I wonder if Kirk—— No, dash it! I won't wonder. I won't be bothered with all these people. We seem curiously unable to get any time to ourselves this honeymoon. And that reminds me—the vicar wants us to go round to his place this evening for a sherry-party."

 

"A sherry-party? Good heavens!"

 

"We provide the party and he provides the sherry. His wife will be so delighted to see us, and will we excuse her not calling first, as she has a Women's Institute this afternoon."

 

"Must we?"

 

"I think we must. Our example has encouraged him to start a sherry-fashion in these parts, and he has sent for a bottle on purpose."

 

Harriet gazed at him in dismay.

 

"Where from?"

 

"From the best hotel in Pagford.... I accepted with pleasure for both of us. Was that wrong?"

 

"Peter, you're not normal. You have a social conscience far in advance of your sex. Public-house sherry at the vicarage! Ordinary, decent men shuffle and lie till their wives drag them out by the ears. There must be something you'll jib at. Will you refuse to put on a boiled shirt?"

 

"Do you think a boiled shirt would please them? I suppose it would. Besides, you've got a new frock you want to show me."

 

"You're definitely too good to live.... Of course we'll go and drink their sherry, if we die of it. But couldn't we just be selfish and naughty this afternoon?"

 

"As how?"

 

"Go off somewhere by ourselves."

 

"By god we will!... Is that really your notion of happiness?"

 

"To that depth have I fallen. I admit it. Don't dance on a woman when she's down. Have some of this—I don't know what it is—this thing Bunter's made. It looks absolutely marvellous."

 

"Just how naughty and selfish may I be?... May I drive fast?... I mean, really fast?"

 

Harriet repressed a shudder. She liked to drive, and even liked being driven, but anything over seventy miles an hour made her feel hollow inside. Still, married people cannot have everything their own way.

 

"Yes, really fast—if you feel like that."

 

"Definitely too good to live!"

 

"I should say, definitely too good to die.... But really fast means the main road."

 

"So it does. Well, we'll do the main road really fast and get rid of it."

 

The ordeal lasted only as far as Great Pagford. Happily they encountered none of Superintendent Kirk's black sheep parked on bends, though, just outside, they shot past Frank Crutchley driving a taxi and were rewarded by his astonished and admiring stare. Passing the police-station at a demure legal thirty, they turned out westward and took to the side-roads. Harriet, who could not distinctly recollect having breathed at all since they left Paggleham, filled her lungs and observed in resolutely steady tones that it was a lovely day for a run.

 

"Isn't it? Do you approve of this road?"

 

"It's beautiful," said Harriet, fervently. "All corners!"

 

He laughed.

 

"Prière de ne pas brutaliser la machine. I ought to know better—God knows I'm frightened of enough things myself. I must have a streak of my father in me. He was one of the old school—you either faced a fence of your own accord or were walloped over and no nonsense. It worked—after a fashion. One learnt to pretend one wasn't a coward, and take out the change in bad dreams."

 

"You certainly don't show any signs of it."

 

"One of these days you'll find me out, I expect. I don't happen to be afraid of speed—that's why I like to show off. But I give you my word I won't do it again, this trip."

 

He let the needle drop back to twenty-five and they dawdled on through the lanes in silence, with no particular direction. About the mid-afternoon, they found themselves in a village some thirty miles from home—an old village with a new church and a pond flanking a trim central green, all clustered at the base of a little rise. On the side opposite the church, a narrow and rather ill-made lane appeared to rise towards the brow of the hill.

 

"Let's go up there," said Harriet, appealed to for instructions. "It looks as though we should get a good view."

 

The car swung into the lane and wound its way up with lazy ease between low hedges already touched with autumn. Below and to their left was spread the pleasant English country, green and russet with well-wooded fields sloping to a stream that twinkled placidly in the October sunshine. Here and there the pale glint of stubble showed amid the pasture; or the blue smoke drifted above the trees from the red chimneys of a farm. On their right, at a bend of the road, they came upon a ruined church, only the porch and a portion of the chancel arch left standing. The other stone-work had doubtless been carried away to build the new church in the centre of the village; but the abandoned graves with their ancient headstones had been trimly kept, and just within the open gate a space had been levelled and made into a kind of garden-plot with flower-beds and a sun-dial and a wooden seat on which visitors could rest to view the distant prospect. Peter gave an exclamation, and let the car slide to a standstill on the grass verge.

 

"May I lose my last dollar," he said, "if that isn't one of our chimney-pots!"

 

"I believe you're right," said Harriet, staring at the sun-dial, whose column did indeed bear a remarkable resemblance to a "Tooder pot." She followed Peter out of the car and through the gate. Seen close to, the sun-dial revealed itself as a miscellany; the dial and gnomon were ancient; the base was a mill-stone; the column, when sharply tapped, sounded hollow.

 

"I will have my pot back," said Peter in determined tones, "if I die for it. We will present the village with a handsome stone pillar in its place. Jack shall have Jill, Naught shall go ill, The man shall have his mare again and all go well. This suggests a new variation of the time-honoured sport of pot-hunting. We will track down our bartered chimneys from end to end of the county, as the Roman legions sought the lost eagles of Varus. I think the luck went out of the house with the chimney-pots, and it's our job to bring it back."

 

"That will be fun. I counted this morning: there are only four of them missing. This looks exactly like the three that are left."

 

"I'm positive it is ours. Something tells me so. Let us register our claim to it by a trifling act of vandalism which the first rain will blot out." He solemnly took out a pencil and inscribed upon the pot: "Talboys, Suam quisque homo rem meminit. Peter Wimsey." He handed the pencil to his wife, who added, "Harriet Wimsey," with the date below.

 

"First time of writing it?"

 

"Yes. It looks a little drunk, but that's because I had to squat down to it."

 

"No matter—it's an occasion. Let's occupy this handsome seat and contemplate the landscape. The car's well off the road if anybody wants to get up the lane."

 

The seat was solid and comfortable. Harriet pulled off her hat and sat down, pleased to feel the soft wind stir her hair. Her gaze wandered idly over the sunlit valley. Peter hung his hat on the extended hand of a stout eighteenth-century cherub engaged in perusing a lichenous book on an adjacent tombstone, sat down on the other end of the seat and stared reflectively at his companion.

 

His spirits were in a state of confusion, into which the discovery of the murder and the problem of Joe Sellon and the clock had introduced only a subsidiary set of disturbing factors. These he dismissed from his mind, and set himself to reduce the chaos of his personal emotions to some sort of order.

 

He had got what he wanted. For nearly six years he directed his resolution stubbornly to a single end. Up to the very moment of achievement he had not paused to consider what might be the results of his victory. The last two days had given him little time for thought. He only knew that he was faced with an entirely strange situation, which was doing something quite extraordinary to his feelings.

 

He forced himself to examine his wife with detachment. Her face had character, but no one would ever think of calling it beautiful, and he had always—carelessly and condescendingly—demanded beauty as a pre-requisite. She was long-limbed and sturdily made, with a kind of loosely-knit freedom of movement that might, with a more controlled assurance, grow into grace; yet he could have named—and if he had chosen might have had—a score of women far lovelier in form and motion. Her speaking voice was deep and attractive; yet, after all, he had once owned the finest lyric soprano in Europe. Otherwise, what?—A skin like pale honey and a mind of a curious, tough quality that stimulated his own. Yet no woman had ever so stirred his blood; she had only to look or speak to make the very bones shake in his body.

 

He knew now that she could render back passion for passion with an eagerness beyond all expectation—and also with a kind of astonished gratitude that told him more than she knew. While a mannerly reticence forbade that the name of her dead lover should ever be mentioned between them, Peter, interpreting phenomena in the light of expert knowledge, found himself mentally applying to that unhappy young man quite a number of epithets, among which "clumsy lout" and "egotistical puppy" were the kindest. But the passionate exchange of felicity was no new experience: what was new was the enormous importance of the whole relationship. It was not merely that the present bond could not be sundered without scandal and expense and the troublesome interference of lawyers. It was that, for the first time in his experience, it really mattered to him what his relations with a lover were. He had somehow vaguely imagined that, the end of desire attained, soul and sense would lie down together like the lion and the lamb; but they did nothing of the sort. With orb and sceptre thrust into his hands, he was afraid to take hold on power and call his empire his own.

 

He remembered having said to his uncle (with a solemn dogmatism better befitting a much younger man): "Surely it is possible to love with the head as well as the heart." Mr. Delagardie had replied, somewhat drily: "No doubt; so long as you do not end by thinking with your entrails instead of your brain." This, he felt, was precisely what was happening to him. As soon as he tried to think, a soft, inexorable clutch seemed to fasten itself upon his bowels. He had become vulnerable in the very point where always, until now, he had been most triumphantly sure of himself. His wife's serene face told him that she had somehow gained all the confidence he had lost. Before their marriage, he had never seen her look like that.

 

"Harriet," he said, suddenly, "what do you think about life? I mean, do you find it good on the whole? Worth living?"

 

(He could, at any rate, trust her not to protest, archly: "That's a nice thing to ask on one's honeymoon!")

 

She turned to him with a quick readiness, as though here was the opportunity to say something she had been wanting to say for a long time:

 

"Yes! I've always felt absolutely certain it was good—if only one could get it straightened out. I've hated almost everything that ever happened to me, but I knew all the time it was just things that were wrong, not everything. Even when I felt most awful I never thought of killing myself or wanting to die—only of somehow getting out of the mess and starting again."

 

"That's rather admirable. With me it's always been the other way round. I can enjoy practically everything that comes along—while it's happening. Only I have to keep on doing things, because, if I once stop, it all seems a lot of rot and I don't care a damn if I go west to-morrow. At least, that's what I should have said. Now—I don't know. I'm beginning to think there may be something in it after all... Harriet——"

 

"It sounds like Jack Sprat and his wife."

 

"If there was any possible chance of straightening it out for you.... We've begun well, haven't we, with this awful bloody mess? When once we get clear of it, I'd give anything. But there you are, you see, it's the same thing over again."

 

"But that's what I'm trying to tell you. It ought to be, but it isn't. Things have come straight. I always knew they would if one hung on long enough, waiting for a miracle."

 

"Honestly, Harriet?"

 

"Well, it seems like a miracle to be able to look forward—to—to see all the minutes in front of one come hopping along with something marvellous in them, instead of just saying, Well, that one didn't actually hurt and the next may be quite bearable if only something beastly doesn't come pouncing out——"

 

"As bad as that?"

 

"No, not really, because one got used to it—to being everlastingly tightened up to face things, you see. But when one doesn't have to any more, it's different—I can't tell you what a difference it makes. You—you—you—— Oh, damn and blast you, Peter, you know you're making me feel exactly like Heaven, so what's the sense of trying to spare your feelings?"

 

"I don't know it and I can't believe it, but come here and I'll try. That's better. His chin was pressed upon her head when the sword came back from sea. No, you are not too heavy—you needn't insult me. Listen, dear, if that's true or even half true, I shall begin to be afraid of death. At my age it's rather disturbing. All right—you needn't apologise. I like new sensations."

 

Women had found paradise in his arms before now—and told him so, with considerable emphasis and eloquence. He had accepted the assurance cheerfully, because he had not really cared whether they found paradise or only the Champs-Elysées, so long as the place was a pleasant one. He was as much troubled and confused now as though somebody had credited him with the possession of a soul. In strict logic, of course, he would have had to admit that he had as much right to a soul as anybody else, but the mocking analogy of the camel and the needle's eye was enough to make that claim stick in his throat as a silly piece of presumption. Of such was not the Kingdom of Heaven. He had the kingdoms of the earth, and they should be enough for him: though nowadays it was in better taste to pretend neither to desire nor deserve them. But he was filled with a curious misgiving, as though he had meddled in matters too high for him; as though he were being forced, body and bones, through some enormous wringer that was squeezing out of him something undifferentiated till now, and even now excessively nebulous and inapprehensible. Vagula, blandula, he thought—pleasantly erratic and surely of no consequence—it couldn't possibly turn into something that had to be reckoned with. He made the mental gesture of waving away an intrusive moth, and tightened his bodily hold on his wife as though to remind himself of the palpable presence of the flesh. She responded with a small contented sound like a snort—an absurd sound that seemed to lift the sealing stone and release some well-spring of laughter deep down within him. It came bubbling and leaping up in the most tremendous hurry to reach the sunlight, so that all his blood danced with it and his lungs were stifled with the rush and surge of this extraordinary fountain of delight. He felt himself at once ridiculous and omnipotent. He was exultant. He wanted to shout.

 

Actually, he neither moved nor spoke. He sat still, letting the mysterious rapture have its way with him. Whatever it was, it was something that had been suddenly liberated and was intoxicated by its new freedom. It was behaving very foolishly and its folly enchanted him.

 

"Peter?"

 

"What is it, lady?"

 

"Have I got any money?"

 

The preposterous irrelevance of the question made the fountain shoot sky-high.

 

"My darling fool, yes, of course you have. We spent a whole morning signing papers."

 

"Yes, I know, but where is it? I mean, can I draw a cheque on it? I was thinking, I'd never paid my secretary her salary and at the moment I haven't got a penny in the world except what's yours."

 

"It isn't mine, it's your own. Settled on you. Murbles explained all that, though I don't suppose you were listening. But I know what you mean, and yes, it's there, and yes, you can draw a cheque on it straight away. Why this state of sudden destitution?"

 

"Because, Mr. Rochester, I wasn't going to be married in grey alpaca. And I spent every blessed thing I had to do you proud, and then some. I left poor Miss Bracey lamenting and borrowed ten bob of her at the last minute for enough petrol to get me to Oxford. That's right, laugh! I did kill my pride—but, oh, Peter! it had a lovely death."

 

"Full sacrificial rites. Harriet, I really believe you love me. You couldn't do anything so unutterably and divinely right by accident. Quelle folie—mais quel geste!"

 

"I thought it would amuse you. That's why I told you instead of borrowing a stamp from Bunter and writing a formal inquiry to the bank."

 

"Meaning that you don't grudge me my victory. Generous woman! While you're about it, tell me something else. How the blazes, with all the other things, did you manage to afford the Donne autograph?"

 

"That was a special effort. Three five-thousand-word shorts at forty guineas each for the Thrill Magazine."

 

"What? The story about the young man who murdered his aunt with a boomerang?"

 

"Yes; and the unpleasant stockbroker who was found in the curate's front parlour with his head bashed in, like old Noakes—— Oh, dear! I was forgetting all about poor Mr. Noakes."

 

"Damn old Noakes! At least, perhaps I'd better not say that. It might be true. I remember the curate. What was the third? The cook who put prussic acid in the almond icing?"

 

"Yes. Where did you get hold of that exceedingly low-class rag? Does Bunter pore over it in his leisure moments?"

 

"No; he reads photographic journals. But there are such things as press-cutting agencies."

 

"Are there, indeed? How long have you been collecting cuttings?"

 

"Nearly six years, isn't it, by now? They lead a shame-faced existence in a locked drawer, and Bunter pretends to know nothing about them. When some impertinent beast of a bone-headed reviewer has turned me dyspeptic with fury, he politely attributes my ill-temper to the inclement season. Your turn to laugh. I had to be maudlin over something, curse it, and you didn't overwhelm me with material. I once lived three weeks on a belated notice in Punch. Brute, fiend, devil-woman—you might say you're sorry."

 

"I can't be sorry for anything. I've forgotten how."

 

He was silent. The fountain had become a stream that ran chuckling and glittering through his consciousness, spreading as it went into a wide river that swept him up and drowned him in itself. To speak of it was impossible; he could only have taken refuge in inanities. His wife looked at him, thoughtfully drew her feet up on to the seat so as to take her weight from his knees and settled herself into acquiescence with his mood.

 

Whether, left to themselves, they would have succeeded in emerging from this speechless trance, and might not, in the manner of Donne's ecstatic couple, have remained like sepulchral statues in the same posture and saying nothing until nightfall, is uncertain. Three-quarters of an hour later an elderly bearded person came creaking up the lane with a horse and wagon. He looked at them with ruminative eyes, showing no particular curiosity; but the spell was broken. Harriet swung herself hurriedly off her husband's knees and stood up; Peter, who in London would rather have been seen dead than embracing anybody in public, astonishingly showed no embarrassment, but cried out a cordial greeting to the carter.

 

"Is my bus in your way?"

 

"No, sir, thank 'ee. Don't disturb yourself."

 

"Lovely day it's been." He strolled down to the gate, and the man checked his horse.

 

"That it has. A real lovely day."

 

"Pleasant little spot, this. Who put up the seat?"

 

"That's squire done that, sir; Mr. Trevor over at the big house. He done it along of the women as likes to come up Sunday arternoons with their flowers and such. The new church ain't only been built five year, and there's a sight of folks likes to 'tend to the graves in the old churchyard. It's closed for buryings now, of course, but squire says, why not make it pleasant and comfor'ble-like. It's a stiffish pull up the lane and weariful to the children and the old people. So that's what he done."

 

"We are very much beholden to him. Was the sun-dial here before that?"

 

The carter chuckled.

 

"Lord love you, no, sir. She's a regular job, is that there sun-dial. Vicar, he found the top of her put away in the rubbish-'ole when they was clearing away the old church, and Bill Muggins he says, 'There's the stone outer the old mill 'ud make a beautiful base for 'er, if so be we 'ad a bit of a drain-pipe or summat to put between 'em.' And Jim Hawtrey, he says, 'I know a man,' he says, 'over at Paggleham wot 'as 'arf-a-dozen of them ancient old chimbley-pots for sale. What's the matter with that?' So they tells vicar and he tells squire and they gets the bits together and Joe Dudden and 'Arry Gates, they puts 'em up with a lick o' mortar in their spare time, vicar puttin' the top on with 'is watch in 'is 'and and a little book so she'll tell the time correct. You'll find 'er middlin' right now, sir, if you look. 'Course, in summer she's an hour out, her keepin' to God's time and us 'aving to go by Gov'ment time. It's a cur'ous thing you askin' about that there sun-dial, because why? The very man wot sold vicar the chimbley-pot, 'e wos found dead in his own 'ouse only yesterday, and they do say it was murder."

 

"You don't say so. It's a queer world, isn't it? What's the name of this village? Lopsley? Thanks very much. Get yourself a drink.... By the way, you know you've got a loose shoe on your near hind?"

 

The carter said he had not noticed it and thanked the observant gentleman for his information. The horse lolloped on.

 

"Time we were getting back," said Peter, with a reluctant note in his voice, "if we're to change in time for the vicar's sherry. We'll call on the squire, though, before we're many days older. I'm determined to have that pot."