“I promised to do something for Apthorpe—you remember him at Penkirk?”
“Yes, I do. Very well.” Exhilarated to find at last a firm mental foothold: “Apthorpe. Temporary officer who somehow got made second-in-command of the battalion. I thought him a bit mad.”
“He’s dead now. I promised I’d collect his possessions and hand them over to his heir. I could do that in the next few days.”
“Excellent. If there’s any bloodiness, that catches them two ways. We can call it compassionate or disembarkation leave, just as the cat jumps. Staying to lunch in the mess? I shouldn’t.”
“I won’t,” said Guy.
“If you hang about, there may be some transport going to the station. Two months ago I could have laid it on. That’s all been stopped.”
“I’ll get a taxi.”
“You know where to find the telephone? Don’t forget to leave twopence in the box. I think I’ll get back to my office. As you say, it’s too cold here.”
Guy lingered. He entered the mess under the gallery which had not so long ago resounded with “The Roast Beef of Old England.” The portraits were gone from the walls, the silver from the side tables. There was little now to distinguish it from the dining-hall of Kut-al-Imara House. An A.T. came in from the serving door whistling; she saw Guy and continued to whistle as she rubbed a cloth over the bare boards of a table.
There was a click of balls from the billiard-room. Guy looked in and saw chiefly a large khaki behind. The player struck and widely missed an easy cannon. He stood up and turned.
“Wait for the shot,” he said with a stern but paternal air which purged the rebuke of all offense.
He was in his shirt-sleeves, revealing braces striped with the Halberdier colors. A red-tabbed tunic hung on the wall. Guy recognized him as an elderly colonel who had pottered about the mess a year ago. “Care for a hundred up?” and “Not much news in the papers today,” had been his constant refrain.
“I’m very sorry, sir,” said Guy.
“Puts a fellow off, you see,” said the colonel. “Care for a hundred up?”
“I’m afraid I’m just going.”
“Everyone here is always going,” said the colonel.
He padded round to his ball and studied the position. It seemed hopeless to Guy.
The colonel struck with great force. All three balls sped and clicked and rebounded and clicked until finally the red trickled slower and slower towards a corner, seemed to come to a dead stop at the edge of the pocket, mysteriously regained momentum and fell in.
“Frankly,” said the colonel, “that was something of a fluke.”
Guy slipped away and gently closed the door. Glancing back through the glazed aperture he observed the next stroke. The colonel put the red on its spot, studied the uncongenial arrangement and then with plump finger and thumb nonchalantly moved his ball three inches to the left. Guy left him to his solitary delinquency. What used the regulars to call him? Ox? Tiny? Hippo? The nickname escaped him.
With sterner thoughts he turned to the telephone and called for his taxi.
So Guy set out on another stage of his pilgrimage, which had begun at the tomb of Sir Roger. Now, as then, an act of pietas was required of him; a spirit was to be placated. Apthorpe’s gear must be retrieved and delivered before Guy was free to follow his fortunes in the King’s service. His road lay backward for the next few days, to Southsand and Cornwall. Chatty Corner, man of the trees, must be found, somewhere in the trackless forests of wartime England.
He paused in the ante-room and turned back the pages of the Visitors’ Book to the record of that guest night last December. There, immediately below Tony Box-Bender’s name, he found “James Pendennis Corner.” But the column where his address or regiment should have stood, lay empty.
III
The last hour of the day at Our Lady of Victory’s Preparatory School, temporarily accommodated at Matchet. Selections from Livy in Mr. Crouchback’s form-room. Black-out curtains drawn. Gas fire hissing. The customary smell of chalk and ink. The Fifth Form drowsy from the football field, hungry for high tea. Twenty minutes to go and the construe approaching unprepared passages.
“Please, sir, it is true, isn’t it, that the Blessed Gervase Crouchback was an ancestor of yours?”
“Hardly an ancestor, Greswold. He was a priest. His brother, from whom I am descended, didn’t behave quite so bravely, I’m sorry to say.”
“He didn’t conform, sir?”
“No, but he kept very quiet—he and his son after him.”
“Do tell us how the Blessed Gervase was caught, sir.”
“I’m sure I’ve told you before.”
“A lot of us were absent that day, sir, and I’ve never quite understood what happened. The steward gave him away, didn’t he?”
“Certainly not. Challoner misread a transcript from the St. Omer’s records and the mistake has been copied from book to book. All our own people were true. It was a spy from Exeter who came to Broome asking for shelter, pretending to be a Catholic.”
The Fifth Form sat back contentedly. Old Crouchers was off. No more Livy.
“Father Gervase was lodged in the north turret of the forecourt. You have to know Broome to understand how it happened. There is only the forecourt, you see, between the house and the main road. Every good house stands on a road or a river or a rock. Always remember that. Only hunting-lodges belong in a park. It was after the Reformation that the new rich men began hiding away from their people…”
It was not difficult to get old Crouchers talking. Greswold major, whose grandfather he had known, was adept at it. Twenty minutes passed.
“… When he was examined by the Council the second time he was so weak that they gave him a stool to sit on.”
“Please, sir, that’s the bell.”
“Oh, dear, I’m afraid I’ve let myself run on, wasting your time. You ought to stop me, Greswold. Well, we’ll start tomorrow where we left off. I shall expect a long, thorough construe.”
“Thank you, sir; good night. It was jolly interesting about the Blessed Gervase.”
“Good night, sir.”
The boys scattered away. Mr. Crouchback buttoned his greatcoat, slung his gas-mask across his shoulder and, torch in hand, walked downhill towards the lightless sea.
The Marine Hotel, which had been Mr. Crouchback’s home for nine years, was as full now as though in the height of summer. Every chair in the Residents’ Lounge was held prescriptively. Novels and knitting were left to mark the squatters’ rights when they ventured out into the mist.
Mr. Crouchback made straight for his own rooms, but encountering Miss Vavasour at the turn of the stairs, he paused, pressing himself into the corner to let her pass.
“Good evening, Miss Vavasour.”
“Oh, Mr. Crouchback, I have been waiting for you. May I speak to you for a moment?”
“Of course, Miss Vavasour.”
“It’s about something that happened today.” She spoke in a whisper. “I don’t want Mr. Cuthbert to overhear me.”
“How very mysterious! I’m sure I have no secrets from the Cuthberts.”
“They have from you. There is a plot, Mr. Crouchback, which you should know about.”
Miss Vavasour had turned about and was now making for Mr. Crouchback’s sitting-room. He opened the door and stood back to admit her. A strong smell of dog met their nostrils.
“Such a nice manly smell,” said Miss Vavasour.
Felix, his golden retriever, rose to meet Mr. Crouchback, stood on his hind legs and pawed Mr. Crouchback’s chest.
“Down, Felix, down, boy. I hope he’s been out.”
“Mrs. Tickeridge and Jenifer took him for a long walk this afternoon.”
“Charming people. Do sit down while I get rid of this absurd gas-bag.”
Mr. Crouchback went into his bedroom, hung up his coat and haversack, peered at his old face in the looking-glass and returned to Miss Vavasour.
“We
ll, what is this sinister plot?”
“They want to turn you out,” said Miss Vavasour.
Mr. Crouchback looked round the shabby little room, full of his furniture and books and photographs. “I don’t think that’s possible,” he said; “the Cuthberts would never do a thing like that—after all these years. You must have misunderstood them. Anyway, they can’t.”
“They can, Mr. Crouchback. It’s one of these new laws. There was an officer here today—at least he was dressed as an officer—a dreadful sort of person. He was counting all the rooms and looking at the register. He talked of taking over the whole place. Mr. Cuthbert explained that several of us were permanent residents and that the others had come from bombed areas and were the wives of men at the front. Then the so-called officer said: ‘Who’s this man occupying two rooms?’ and do you know what Mr. Cuthbert said? He said, ‘He works in the town. He’s a schoolteacher.’ You, Mr. Crouchback, to be described like that!”
“Well, it’s what I am, I suppose.”
“I very nearly interrupted them then and there, to tell them who you are, but of course I wasn’t really part of the conversation. In fact I don’t think they realized I was within hearing. But I boiled. Then this officer asked: ‘Secondary or Primary?’ and Mr. Cuthbert said: ‘Private’ and then the officer laughed and said: ‘Priority nil.’ And after that I simply could not restrain myself any more so I simply got up and looked at them and left the room without a word.”
“I’m sure you did much the wisest thing.”
“But the impertinence of it!”
“I’m sure nothing will come of it. There are all sorts of people all over the place nowadays making inquiries. I suppose it’s necessary. Depend upon it, it was just routine. The Cuthberts would never do a thing like that. Never. After all these years.”
“You are too trustful, Mr. Crouchback. You treat everyone as if he were a gentleman. That officer definitely was not.”
“It was very kind of you to warn me, Miss Vavasour.”
“It makes me boil,” she said.
When Miss Vavasour had gone Mr. Crouchback took off his boots and socks, his collar and his shirt and standing before the wash-hand-stand in trousers and vest washed thoroughly in cold water. He donned a clean shirt, collar and socks, shabby pumps and a slightly shabby suit made of the same cloth as he had worn throughout the day. He brushed his hair. And all the time he thought of other things than Miss Vavasour’s disclosure. She had cherished a chivalrous devotion for him since she first settled at Matchet. His daughter Angela joked of it rather indelicately. For the six years of their acquaintance he had paid little heed to anything Miss Vavasour said. Now he dismissed the Cuthbert plot and considered two problems that had come to him with the morning’s post. He was a man of regular habit and settled opinion. Doubt was a stranger to him. That morning, in the hour between Mass and school, he had been confronted with two intrusions from an unfamiliar world.
The more prominent was the parcel; bulky and ragged from the investigations of numberless clumsy departmental hands. It was covered with American stamps, customs declarations and certificates of censorship.
“American parcel” was just beginning to find a place in the English vocabulary. This was plainly one of these novelties. His three Box-Bender granddaughters had been sent to a place of refuge in New England. Doubtless it came from them. “How kind. How very extravagant,” he had thought and had borne it to his room for later study.
Now he cut the string with his nail scissors and spread the contents in order on his table.
First came six tins of “Pullitzer’s Soup.” They were variously, lusciously named but soup was one of the few articles of diet in which the Marine Hotel abounded. Moreover, he had an ancient conviction that all tinned foods were made of something nasty. “Silly girls. Well, I daresay we shall be glad of it one day.” Next there was a transparent packet of prunes. Next a very heavy little tin labeled “Brisko. A Must in every home.” There was no indication of its function. Soap? Concentrated fuel? Rat poison? Boot polish? He would have to consult Mrs. Tickeridge. Next a very light larger tin named “Yumcrunch.” This must be edible for it bore the portrait of an obese and badly brought-up little girl waving a spoon and fairly bawling for the stuff. Last and oddest of all a bottle filled with what seemed to be damp artificial pearls, labeled “Cocktail Onions.” Could it be that this remote and resourceful people, who had so generously (and, he thought, so unnecessarily) sheltered his grandchildren; this people whose chief concern seemed to be the frustration of the processes of nature—could they have contrived an alcoholic onion?
Mr. Crouchback’s elation palled; he studied his gift rather fretfully. Where in all this exotic banquet was there anything for Felix? The choice seemed to lie between Brisko and Yumcrunch.
He shook Yumcrunch. It rattled. Broken biscuits? Felix stood and pointed his soft muzzle.
“Yumcrunch?” said Mr. Crouchback seductively. Felix’s tail thumped the carpet.
And then suspicion darkened Mr. Crouchback’s contentment: suppose this were one of those new patent foods he had heard described, something “dehydrated” which, eaten without due preparation, swelled enormously and fatally in the stomach.
“No, Felix,” he said. “No Yumcrunch. Not until I have asked Mrs. Tickeridge,” and at the same time he resolved to consult that lady about his other problem: the matter of Tony Box-Bender’s odd postcard and Angela Box-Bender’s odd letter.
The postcard had been enclosed in the letter. He had taken both to school with him and reread them often during the day. The letter read:
Lower Chipping Manor,
Nr Tetbury
Dearest Papa,
News at last from Tony. Nothing very personal poor boy but such a joy to know he is safe. Until this morning I didn’t realize how anxious I have been. After all the man who got away and wrote to us that he had seen Tony in the P.O.W. column might have been mistaken. Now we know.
He seems to think we can send him anything he needs but Arthur has been into it and says no, that isn’t the arrangement. Arthur says he can’t approach neutral embassies and I mustn’t write to America either. Only regular Red Cross parcels may be sent and they get those anyhow apparently whether we pay for them or not. Arthur says the parcels are scientifically chosen so as to have all the right calories and that there can’t be one law for the rich and one for the poor when it comes to prison. I see he’s quite right in a way.
The girls seem to be enjoying America tremendously.
How is Dotheboys Hall?
Love,
Angela
Tony’s card read:
Was not allowed to write before. Now in permanent camp. A lot of our chaps here. Can daddy arrange parcels through neutral embassies? This is most important and everyone says safest and quickest way. Please send cigarettes, chocolates, golden syrup, cocoa, tinned meat and fish (all kinds). Glucose D. Hard biscuits (ships’), cheese, toffee, condensed milk, camel hair sleeping bag, air-cushion, gloves, hair brush. Could girls in U.S. help? Also Boulestin’s Conduct of Kitchen, Trumper’s Eucris. Woolly slippers.
There had been one other letter in Mr. Crouchback’s post, which saddened him though it presented no problem. His wine merchants wrote to say that their cellars had been partly destroyed by enemy action. They hoped to maintain diminished supplies to their regular customers but could no longer fulfill specific orders. Monthly parcels would be made up from whatever stock was available. Pilfering and breakages were becoming frequent on the railways. Customers were requested to report all losses immediately.
Parcels, thought Mr. Crouchback. Everything that day seemed to be connected with parcels.
*
After dinner, according to the custom of more than a year, Mr. Crouchback joined Mrs. Tickeridge in the Residents’ Lounge.
Their conversation began, as always, with the subject of Felix’s afternoon exercise. Then:
“Guy’s home. I hope we shall see him here soon. I don
’t know what he’s up to. Something rather secret, I expect. He came back with his brigadier—the man you call ‘Ben.’ ”
Mrs. Tickeridge had that day received a letter from her husband in which certain plain hints informed her that Brigadier Ritchie-Hook had got into another of his scrapes. Well trained in service propriety she changed the subject.
“And your grandson?”
“That’s just what I wanted to ask about. My daughter has had this postcard. May I show it to you—and her letter? Aren’t they puzzling?”
Mrs. Tickeridge took the documents and perused them. At length she said: “I don’t think I ever read Trumper’s Eucris.”
“No, no. It’s not that I’m puzzled by. That’s hair-stuff. Used to use it myself. But don’t you think it very peculiar that in his first postcard home he should only be asking for things for himself? It’s most unlike him.”
“I expect he’s hungry, poor boy.”
“Surely not? Prisoners of war have full army rations. There’s an international agreement about it, I know. You don’t suppose it’s a code. ‘Glucose D’—whoever heard of ‘Glucose D’? I’m sure Tony has never seen the stuff. Someone put him up to it. You would think that a boy writing to his mother for the first time, when he must know how anxious she has been, would have something better to say than ‘Glucose D.’ ”
“Perhaps he’s really hungry.”
“Even so, he ought to consider his mother’s feelings. You’ve read her letter?”
“Yes.”
“I’m sure she’s got quite the wrong end of the stick. My son-in-law is in the House of Commons and of course he picks up some rather peculiar ideas there.”
“No, it’s been on the wireless.”
“The wireless,” said Mr. Crouchback in a tone as near bitterness as he possessed. “The wireless. Just the sort of thing they would put about. It seems to me the most improper idea. Why should we not send what we want to those we love—even ‘Glucose D’?”