"Your poor dear uncle," said Mrs. Eames to Beth, "is more tiresome than I've ever known him before. Not that I want to say a word against him. He's a darling, but it is tiresome of him to spend all of every day in the church. I never see him except at night, and do you know what I found out yesterday? He's taken a spade and a pickaxe up there with him. At least, if he hasn't taken them I don't know what's happened to them. I can't find them. The man who does the garden wanted the spade yesterday, and while he was looking for it he found that the pickaxe was gone too. So annoying."
"Couldn't be digging graves, could he?" said Jimmy not very helpfully.
"Oh, no," said Mrs. Eames. "Poor Timothy never does anything as useful as that. You wouldn't think it of him if you knew him, Lord Colavon, and of course it may not be he who has taken the spade. I only said he hadbecause I can't think of anyone else who would take it. But what would he want a pickaxe for inside the church? And he never comes out. He just sits there all day, reading Greek, you know."
Sir Evelyn, though he did not say so, was of opinion that the vicar must have gone mad. St. Paul, who also seems to have read Greek books, was suspected of having been driven insane through much learning. Something of the sort might have happened to Mr. Eames; but Sir Evelyn was more inclined to lay the blame on Mrs. Eames. He thought it likely that he would be mad too if he had been married to her.
"So you're really an actress," said Mrs. Eames, turning abruptly to Mary. "You did say she was a real actress, didn't you, Beth? Isn't that lucky? You must know all about pageants, if you're an actress, and you'll be able to help us. I do want someone to help. You'll come and stay with us till the pageant's over, won't you? You can have Beth's room. Or if Beth comes too, you can share it. You'll come, won't you, Beth?"
"Miss Lambert and Miss Appleby," said Sir Evelyn, "have kindly consented to stay with me till the play is over."
"Quite right," said Mrs. Eames cheerfully. "They'll be far more comfortable with you. I'd love to have them both. You know that, Beth. But—well, you know what Gladys is like."
"But of course I'll help," said Mary. "I'll come over every day."
"How splendid. We'll have a rehearsal this afternoon. Gladys shall run round the village and tell the people. She'll like doing that far better than cooking lunch. I'm afraid there isn't very much for lunch. You see, I haven't been having regular meals since poor dear Timothy took to living in the church. But we might have pancakes. You like pancakes, don't you, Sir Evelyn?"
"We shouldn't dream of trespassing on your kindness, Mrs. Eames," said Sir Evelyn. "We brought our own luncheon with us."
"So if you'll just lend us knives and forks, Aunt Agatha," said Beth.
Many women, slaves to conventionality,would have been vexed to think that guests, arriving at luncheon time, had brought their own food with them. Mrs. Eames was not even ruffled.
"But you must have pancakes too," she said, "and scrambled eggs. I'm rather good at scrambled eggs. And luckily the hens are all laying just now. Generally they do nothing but go broody at this time of year. It may have been excitement about the pageant which kept them from sitting. Not that they understand what's happening, poor things, but excitement gets into the air. So we can have pancakes and scrambled eggs. I know you like scrambled eggs, Sir Evelyn."
"Oh, greatly," said Sir Evelyn. "But I really wish you wouldn't take so much trouble."
"It won't be any trouble," said Mrs. Eames. "Gladys's aunt is nearly sure to be in the kitchen, and if so she can make the pancakes. Gladys can't or won't or both. I wish I could offer you an omelette. Beth, dear, can you make omelettes?"
"I can," said Mary Lambert. "At least I think I can. Do let me try."
"I used to think I could," said Mrs. Eames, "and sometimes I can, but not always. In fact generally my omelettes turn out to be scrambled eggs. That's why I think it's better to say scrambled eggs at once. Then if they do happen to be omelettes it's a pleasant surprise, whereas if I said omelettes and then produced scrambled eggs Timothy might be disappointed. Come along, Mary dear. You won't mind my calling you Mary, will you. It's so stiff to go on saying Miss Lambert when we're going to make an omelette together. You can get out the plates and lay the table, Beth. You'll find a table cloth somewhere. I'm sure Sir Evelyn would like a table cloth and I have several if only they're clean. The fact is, I never have a table cloth when Timothy isn't here. I know I ought to. So bad for Gladys when I don't."
She took Mary by the arm and led her off to the kitchen.
"I think," said Beth, "that I'd better go and look for the table cloth."
"Wait one moment," said Jimmy, "till I get the luncheon basket out of the car and thenI'll be with you. I feel sure it'll take two of us to find that table cloth."
"Am I to be left alone?" said Sir Evelyn. "I don't like it. If Mrs. Eames comes back and finds me unprotected—— Perhaps the best thing for me to do would be to join the vicar in the church. Do you suppose he took the pickaxe as a weapon of defence? I feel as if I should like something of the sort."
"Your aunt," said Jimmy, a few minutes later, "is perfectly priceless."
They were searching in the dining-room for the table cloth and so far had not come on a trace of it.
"There's a lot of go about her," said Beth.
"Go! I should think there was. I only wish there was half as much in the Pallas Athene. I wonder now, if I asked her very nicely, would she come over to Morriton St. James some day and take a look at that car. If anyone could get a move on the wretched thing it would be your aunt. She'd make anything in the world hop up and run about."
The rehearsal in the afternoon was a success, though tiring to all who took part in it.
Gladys, useless as housemaid or cook, showed that there was something she could do really well when she was turned into a messenger. Released quite unexpectedly from duties she detested, she sped joyfully round the village, summoning performers to the mouth of the cave at three o'clock. Her excited account of the ladies and gentlemen who had come from London to organise the pageant, roused fresh interest in an affair which the people were beginning to find a little tiresome.
Gladys did more than summon the performers. She summoned everyone else too, insisting that the whole village should turn out. She even gave, in the name of the vicar, a totally unauthorised order to the schoolmaster that the children should be released an hour before the proper time. The schoolmaster knew quite well that the vicar had sent no such message; and would have acted without authority if hehad; but he wanted to see the rehearsal himself, so he pretended to believe Gladys. In this he showed not only self-indulgence but wisdom. It was doubtful whether he could have kept the children in school if he had wanted to.
Mrs. Eames's arrangements had been carefully made, and the great scene thoroughly thought out. Old Bunce's boat, representing the lugger, lay a hundred yards off the mouth of the cave. At the oars sat eight of the steadiest and most reliable men in the village, chosen to be the crew of the lugger on the day of the performance. With these men there was no trouble at all. They took the business seriously and were ready to do exactly as Mrs. Eames bade them. They sat, over their outstretched oars, ready to pull to the shore the moment the signal was given.
Tommy Whittle and his mentally deficient brother were the signallers. At the actual performance they were to light a flare on top of the church tower. At rehearsal they merely waved a flag from the churchyard wall. The lighting of flares in broad daylight would have been foolishly wasteful, and they could not getinto the tower, even for purposes of rehearsal, because the vicar kept all the church doors locked. Their part was clear, and Tommy thoroughly understood it. His brother, in spite of his feebleness of mind, was quite capable of doing what he was told. Indeed he was more likely to obey orders literally and swiftly than a man who could think for himself; which shows that it is a mistake to develop the intelligence of soldiers, trade unionists, the rank and file of political parties, and others who depend on discipline for their efficiency.
On the green beside the boat haven, where the nets were dried and the geese paraded, it was arranged that eight pack horses should stand ready to be loaded with smuggled goods. Each horse was to be in charge of two girls. This was perhaps not strictly in accordance with historical precedent, but Mrs. Eames felt that some female parts were required and the holding of the heads of pack horses seemed the most suitable thing for girls to do. Only one horse could be secured for the rehearsals, so the sixteen girls took it in turn to hold the creature.
On the occasion of the great rehearsal summoned by Gladys the whole sixteen girls turned out and argued fiercely, each pair alleging that it was their turn to hold the horse. Mrs. Eames's first duty, when she came down with her party from the vicarage, was to settle this dispute, a very difficult thing, for the mothers of the girls were all there eager to support their daughters' cause. This made a total of twenty-eight women (four mothers had two daughters each), who all talked at once and loudly. Perhaps only Mrs. Eames among living Englishwomen could have talked down so many competitors. The horse itself, an elderly wise beast, strolled about the green, nibbling at the grass. It would have been there when wanted even if no girl had held its head. Village maidens, when intent on claiming their rights, are voluble. Their mothers, having had more practice, talk even more and faster. All, mothers and daughters, talked at once. Sir Evelyn, who walked with Mrs. Eames at the head of the party from the vicarage, looked hopelessly at the turmoil. Jimmy and the two girls stopped at the edge of the green, waiting to see howMrs. Eames would deal with the situation. Her plan was simple. She talked faster, louder and with shorter pauses for breath than anyone else. One by one the girls were battered into silence by a hailstorm of words. One by one their mothers gave up the unequal contest. Then Mrs. Eames selected two girls to hold the horse, and, by way of compensation for disappointment, promised that a little later Mary Lambert would teach them all the proper way to do it, the way proper to the occasion, the way horses are held on the stage.
"Miss Lambert," said Mrs. Eames, "is a real actress, and she knows all about pageants and exactly how things ought to be done. As soon as the rehearsal is over you shall all come back here and she'll show you."
Mary Lambert had never held a horse in her life on or off the stage. She said so to Mrs. Eames in an appealing whisper.
"Or if she doesn't teach you that," said Mrs. Eames, "she'll teach you something else quite as nice. But you must keep quiet now and let me get on with the rehearsal. What will you teach them, Mary?"
"I'll teach them to dance," she said. "I'll teach them my Nautch Girl dance. It's tremendously fetching and they'll be able to learn their part quite easily. You'll be able to fit it in somewhere, won't you, Mrs. Eames?"
Sir Evelyn protested feebly against a Nautch Girl dance in a pageant of eighteenth century English life; but he was not allowed to say very much. Mrs. Eames welcomed the proposal and explained just where and when the dance could take place.
That settled the trouble on the green; but worse trouble waited at the mouth of the cave.
All children have an instinct which enables them to know with certainty when they will be most troublesome to their elders, and a desire, which they make no effort to suppress, to collect together in just that place. The Hailey Compton school children, who might have found amusement in helping their elder sisters to hold the horse or in watching the Whittles waving the signal flag, preferred to gather at the mouth of the cave. Having unexpectedly escaped from school they were full of vitality and spirits. The whole sixty of them ran rapidly to and froin different directions, leaped from rock to rock with shouts of joy, and often fell, the tumbles being followed by cries of pain.
Besides the children there were some thirty or forty village people who had no part in the pageant gathered at the mouth of the cave. Their number was increased by the arrival of the fourteen girls who had been told not to hold the horse, and the whole twelve mothers. Mrs. Eames had to deal with them as well as with the children.
Her difficulties were increased by young Jim Bunce, son of the man chosen to be captain of the lugger. He had been given the part of leader of the men on shore who landed the cargo. He had lost a complicated arrangement of ropes and pulleys which he called a tackle. This was a valuable, according to his account an indispensable, stage property. Nothing, so he said, could be done unless the tackle was found.
"How are us to unload the boat without we have a tackle?" he asked, and kept on asking in a steady, emotionless monotone.
He regarded Mrs. Eames as responsible forthe tackle, blamed her for the loss and seemed to take it for granted that she either knew where the thing was or possessed some means of finding it out. He did not actually say so, but his tone implied that if the rehearsal and the final performance broke down, as they would unless the tackle was found, Mrs. Eames would have no one to blame except herself. He had a statement which he made repeatedly and very slowly about the loss. After the last rehearsal he had left the tackle coiled up and in good order on top of a rock far above high-water mark just inside the cave. From that rock it had disappeared. This must have been true, for he repeated it at least twenty times without the smallest variation of detail.
While Mrs. Eames appealed to the unwanted people to go away, Jimmy Bunce appealed to her to find his tackle. While she pursued flying children he followed her. When she caught a child he caught her and repeated his statement. When she paused breathless after vain pursuit of a swift child, Jimmy Bunce was at her side. Sometimes he attributed the loss of the tackle to evilly disposed people inspired by the devilwho had entered into them. Sometimes he seemed to think that the devil had acted personally in the matter, without using human agency. But—whether man or devil were the culprit—he held that Mrs. Eames was responsible.
She ought to have managed somehow to bring to naught the evil that the craft and subtlety of the devil or man had worked against Jimmy Bunce. If she had not done or could not do that, then the vicar, so Jimmy hinted, ought to give up saying the Litany.
Gladys managed to add a little to Mrs. Eames's difficulties. She had been given a responsible and important job to do. The signallers, Whittle and his brothers, could not see how the preparations for landing were getting on, because the churchyard wall, where they were stationed, was just above the mouth of the cave. Someone had to run off to the end of the beach and tell them when all was ready for the signal to be given. Gladys undertook to do this and promised to stand waving her arms in full view of the Whittles when the time came for the arrival of the boat. She was eager andexcited, so eager and excited that she ran after Mrs. Eames wherever she went, asking whether her time of action had yet come.
Mary Lambert viewed the scene with professional calm. She was accustomed to a certain amount of confusion at early rehearsals and felt confident that things would settle down at the end. In the meantime she caught Mrs. Eames whenever she could and asked intelligent and important questions. "Where," for instance, "would the spectators be on the day of the performance?" "Where would the orchestra be placed?" "What kind of platform would be provided for the Nautch Girl dance?"
Mrs. Eames, one of those fortunate people who enjoy fuss, replied to her as she replied to Jimmy Bunce and Gladys, without a sign of irritation, though sometimes a little hurriedly.
Sir Evelyn was gloomy. It did not seem to him possible that order would ever be achieved or the rehearsal be done. He asked himself, not for the first time, whether he had not been a fool to mix himself up with any undertaking managed by a woman like Mrs. Eames. Foreseeingreproaches afterwards, he bitterly regretted having asked his friends to be patrons of the pageant. He sat on a rock with his back to the turmoil and gazed out to sea. There, a hundred yards or so from the shore, lay Bunce's laden boat. The crew sat bent over their outstretched oars, calm and indifferent to the passing of time. Now and then when the rising tide carried their boat eastward, they dipped their oars, and with quiet, effortless motion regained their position off the mouth of the cave. Sir Evelyn, smoking cigarette after cigarette, marvelled at a patience which he could not hope to imitate.
Young Bunce left Mrs. Eames for a while and fastened on Sir Evelyn. He was not an Ancient Mariner, and his eye was more fishy than glittering, but he held his auditor as firmly as Coleridge's hero held his. The tale of the lost tackle was not so long as that of the lost ship, but Sir Evelyn had to listen to it three times and always with the feeling—successfully conveyed also to Mrs. Eames—that he was to blame for the disaster. Sir Evelyn tried the plan constantly adopted by worried men. AnAnglo-Saxon king gave Dane Gelt to the invaders of the land. Modern statesmen give increasing doles to the insurgent proletariat. Sir Evelyn gave young Bunce ten shillings with which to buy another tackle. Bunce accepted the money, explaining as he did so that tackles are made and not bought and that it would take at least a week to achieve a new one. But the ten shillings was not wasted. Unlike the ancient Dane Gelt and the modern dole, it achieved its object. Jimmy Bunce went away. He feared that if he stayed he might be forced to give the money back. Although tackles cannot be bought other things can, and young Bunce wanted to keep the money if he could.
"Beth," said Jimmy, "I'm almost fed up with this."
They had been watching Mrs. Eames's efforts to get her company together and to clear the stage of superfluous people. They had even tried to help her. When it became clear that they were doing more harm than good they stood on a rock above the tumult and watched again. It was after ten minutes of this second watching that Jimmy became bored.
"Let's toddle off somewhere," he said.
"Where?" said Beth. "Back to the vicarage?"
"I suppose," said Jimmy, "that there's no chance of raising a couple of cocktails anywhere?"
"There's James Hinton's pub. But——"
"No go. Hinton would manage it if he was there. Not a fellow in England is better at dry Martinis than Hinton. But he's not there. He's probably buying a dress shirt for me and a ready-made dinner jacket from his friend Linker, so we may regard the cocktails as off."
"Would you care to look at the church?"
"No. Why should I?"
"People generally do in strange places," said Beth. "It's one of the things that's always done."
"Can't think why. I hate churches myself."
"So do I." said Beth; "but there's nothing else to see in Hailey Compton except—— What about exploring the cave?"
"Is there anything to explore?"
"It's supposed to go miles and miles inland,"said Beth, "and nobody's ever been to the end of it. They say it's haunted."
"Ghosts of dead smugglers! Let's go and find one."
"There won't be any if I go," said Beth. "Nothing spooky ever comes off when I'm there. I've tried lots of times. Spiritualist séances and so on. The beastly things work all right, so I'm told, till I come, but then they simply dry up."
"I'm not particularly spooky myself," said Jimmy, "but we might try. Hunting the elusive ghost would be better than standing here, even if we don't run one to earth."
They climbed down from their rock and pushed their way among the groups of pageant actors, unwanted spectators, and children who were beginning to tire of running about. They scrambled over a ridge of sharp rocks and dropped on to a broad track covered, like the beach outside, with round white stones. The sound of the voices behind them grew fainter. Even Mrs. Eames's voice died away. Their steps upon the rolling stones made a hollow, growling sound which reverberated from thewalls and roof of the cave, multiplied and increased in volume.
The light grew feebler as they went on. They felt, rather than saw, that they were ascending steeply. But the roof of the cave was still remotely high, only dimly discernible in the gloom, and the walls were still far apart. There were no signs of coming to the end.
Beth turned and looked round. The sea and sky were like a picture in a frame, very distant, incredibly bright. Bunce's boat, the crew still crouched over their oars, was plainly to be seen. The moving figures at the entrance to the cave were silhouetted black outlines against the background of sea and sky. Beth, in a voice which sounded strangely deep, called Jimmy to look.
After that they saw the world outside no more. The cave bent to the right. The light got feebler, so dim that now and then Jimmy had to strike matches in order to be able to see what was before them. It was plain at last that the walls were closing in, that the way was narrowed and the roof lower than it had been.
"Getting near the end," said Jimmy. "If we're to come on a ghost of any sort it must be now or never."
"Listen," said Beth suddenly.
She spoke in a gasp, the toneless whisper of someone who is frightened.
From far above them came sounds, sometimes of light tapping, sometimes as if a man were scraping at the roof of the cave. Jimmy struck another match, one of the last left in his box, and held it out in front of him. They had reached the end of the cave. The roof above them descended sharply and met a wall of solid rock through which there was no possibility of passing. But in the roof there was a hole. The match held aloft revealed it, very black, wide as the chimneys of the fireplaces to be found in old houses. It was from the hole that the sounds of tapping and scraping came.
Suddenly from very far up came a new sound, a distant rattling. It increased and drewnearer. A large stone, striking the sides of the chimney sharply as it descended, crashed at their feet and was shattered into atoms.
Such a thing was alarming enough without any suggestion of the supernatural about it. The force with which the stone struck the ground showed that it had fallen from a considerable height. Jimmy seized Beth by the arm and pulled her to one side of the cave, out of reach of other stones which might come crashing down.
"Oh," gasped Beth, "what is it?"
"Sounds rather like a smuggler's ghost pelting us," said Jimmy. "A damned dangerous thing to do in a place like this without shouting 'Heads' or 'Fore' or any kind of warning."
"Jimmy," said Beth, "I'm terrified."
She was experiencing for the first time in her life a kind of fear which she had often laughed at. It is easy enough to be cheerfully sceptical about ghosts in broad daylight and among familiar things, or to boast of immunity from spookiness when nothing unusual is happening. It is quite another matter when stones take to falling out of a black unknown into a narrow,gloomy place, where every movement and every word make hollow sounds, horribly suggestive of infernal things, when the terrifying crash echoes from rocks on the right, on the left and above, when there is no way of accounting for such happenings. Then cheery scepticism is likely to be chased away by awe. Beth was a prey to the kind of fear in which investigators of the occult find a painful delight, an excruciating ecstasy, which, in apologising to the rest of us, the experimenters call scientific curiosity.
She clung tight to Jimmy's arm with both hands.
For a minute or two they stood waiting and listening. No more stones dropped down the chimney. The noise of tapping and scratching which they had heard ceased. There was complete silence, as dull and heavy as the atmosphere of the cave. It was Jimmy who broke it. He had been puzzled by the noise above him and startled by the falling stone, but he had not felt the fear of the supernatural which had swept over Beth. When he spoke it was in a tone very reassuring to the girl who clung to him.
"Futile sort of old ghost," he said. "I don't call one stone much of a demonstration, do you?"
"But," said Beth, who was recovering her self-possession, "it wasn't really a ghost. I mean to say, it couldn't have been. But what was it? Who dropped the stone?"
"If you ask me, I'm inclined to think——"
There he stopped abruptly. The noises of tapping and scraping had begun again. Tap, tap, tap, far up above their heads, and then a crunching sound. It was as if someone at a considerable distance was striking with a pickaxe and shovelling up loose earth. Jimmy listened intently.
"If you ask me," he repeated, "I'm inclined to think that somebody is trying to knock a hole in the roof of this cave. What's above us here, Beth?"
"I don't know," said Beth. "The cliff, I suppose."
"Well, then, there's somebody on the top of the cliff digging a hole. Can't imagine what he wants to do such a thing for!"
He struck a match and looked up. The hole,a large space of inky blackness, was some six feet from the ground. It was wide and the rocks at its side were jagged.
"If I could get a grip on that craggy bit that is sticking out," said Jimmy, "I could pull myself up into the hole. It's probably easy enough climbing after that. Just stand clear for a minute while I jump. I'll have a try at it."
But Beth was not inclined to let him try. Instead of standing clear she clung to him more tightly than before.
"Don't do it, Jimmy," she said.
"Still nervous about the smuggler's ghost?"
"I'm not thinking about ghosts. Suppose another stone came down when you were halfway up that chimney?"
That was a real peril and Jimmy was obliged to consider it. Jammed tight in what might very well prove to be a narrow passage he would be quite defenceless against a falling stone. As if to emphasise the reality of the risk, there came rumbling and clattering down the chimney a shower of pebbles and loose earth. Beth was startled again—so startled, that she loosedher grasp round Jimmy's elbow and flung her arms round his neck.
"Jimmy, dearest," she said, "you'll be killed if you go."
It is very likely that he would have been killed, for a small avalanche of stones, pebbles and earth came rushing down. The loose debris clattered and crashed on the floor of the cave, some of the stones rolling up to Beth's feet. Jimmy pulled her back still further from the hole.
"Don't go, Jimmy," she said.
"All right. I won't. It's not good enough. But I say, Beth——"
Relieved of her fear for him and far enough from the hole to feel safe herself, Beth realised that she was clinging very close to Jimmy. The position, though very pleasant for him, was embarrassing for her. She drew away quickly.
"I say, Beth," said Jimmy, "don't do that. What I mean to say is, go on doing that. Don't you think you ought to?"
"I'm quite sure I ought not. I can't think how I came to do it."
"If I say I'm going up the hole, you might do it again. Would you?"
"Certainly not."
"But when we're married," said Jimmy, "you'll more or less have to. I mean to say, it's the regular thing then. So I've always understood. And as we're engaged to be married now——"
"We're not."
"Well, as good as engaged."
"We're not as good as engaged. I've told you that a dozen times at least, Jimmy. The most that I ever said was that we might be some time or other."
"Can't see why not now," said Jimmy. "Here we are facing unknown dangers together, practically in the dark, and I've only one match left, pelted with stones by the ghosts of desperate smugglers, lost in the depths of a cavern measureless to man. If you won't agree to marry me now, Beth, I don't see how you ever will. It's a priceless opportunity. In all the novels I've ever read the heroine's maidenly resistance invariably collapses in the hour of peril—far less peril than ours, generally only alion or a painted savage, absolutely nothing to a vengeful ghost."
"Jimmy, dear, don't be silly. I'm still a little frightened. Let's get out of this."
"If you're unmoved by the romance of the situation, though I don't see how anyone can be—— I say, just listen to that." The remote digger was apparently working harder than ever. The blows of iron on stone sounded clear and frequent. "How can you refuse to fall into the arms of your lover when a ghost is digging his own grave a few feet above your head?"
"Do talk sense, Jimmy, and take me out of this."
"I will. I'll do both. Talk sense first and then take you away. Uncle Evie was at me last night about you."
"About me?"
"Asking me why the deuce I didn't marry you."
"Is that what you call talking sense? Sir Evelyn couldn't have said that?"
"He did. He put it to me at the point of the bayonet. I can't remember his exact words,but what they amounted to was this: If I didn't marry you, he would. Now what do you say to that?"
"I say that you've got an extraordinarily inventive mind. Also that you oughtn't to tell lies about your uncle."
"It's not a lie," said Jimmy, "though I admit it's not the whole truth. The suggestion was that I should marry either you or Mary and that he'd marry the other, or rather that he'd marry one of you and I'd marry the other. I give you my solemn word of honour that that's what passed between us last night after you'd gone to bed."
"You give me your solemn word of honour that Sir Evelyn suggested——"
"As a matter of actual fact," said Jimmy, "the suggestion came from me. But Uncle Evie quite fell in with it. Quite. He hadn't a word to say against it."
"Very well," said Beth, "I'll marry your Uncle Evie as soon as he asks me, and then you can marry Mary if she'll have you, which she probably won't. So now that's settled."
"Very well. I'll give you a wedding presentand all that. But now what about marrying me after Uncle Evie dies? I don't want him to die, for he's always been very decent to me. Still, nobody lives for ever, and he's well over sixty. What do you say to that?"
"If I'm ever left a widow and you're a widower about the same time—don't forget you promised to marry Mary—I'll marry you. Will that satisfy you?"
"It doesn't in the least. But I suppose it's as much as I'll get out of you to-day."
"You won't get even that unless you take me out of this beastly cave where I'm smothering for want of air and terrified out of my senses."
They stumbled back together to the bend in the cave from which it was possible to see the sunlight. Beth drew a deep breath of relief and hurried forward, as fast as it was possible to hurry over a track of round, rolling stones.
"Don't rush so, Beth," said Jimmy. "I'm out of breath, and there's something I want to say to you."
"If it's anything more about my marrying your uncle," said Beth, "I won't listen to it."
"It's not. It's something more about your marrying me."
They had reached the mouth of the cave. The rehearsal, well started at last, was going on in a serious and orderly way. Old Bunce's boat had reached the pool and was made fast to the rocks. Her cargo was being landed. Mrs. Eames shouted orders from the top of the rock off which she had dived on the day when Sir Evelyn first met her. The superfluous people and all the children were herded together under the charge of Mary Lambert, who prevented their interfering with the performance. Sir Evelyn, perched somewhat perilously beside Mrs. Eames, was looking on with satisfaction. Everybody was too busy and too deeply interested to take any notice of Beth and Jimmy when they came from the depths of the cave.
"Beth," said Jimmy, "I'm quite serious this time."
"So am I," said Beth. "I like you, Jimmy. I've always liked you; but I'm not going to marry a man who—— But I've told you all that a dozen times."
"You have," said Jimmy, "and I quite seeyour point. I'm a rotter, a footering butterfly, perching on the flowers of life instead of gathering honey like a good, laborious bee. I don't go in for work and all that sort of piffle. That's it, isn't it, Beth? That's what you say."
"Look at Aunt Agatha," said Beth, "married to a man who doesn't do anything, who just sits and moons and dreams."
"Hang it all, Beth, you can't think I'd spend my life shut up in a church if you married me. I'm not that sort at all."
"You'd spend your life playing about with motor-cars and things," she said. "And, Jimmy, dear, can't you see that I couldn't bear to be married to a man who didn't do anything?"
"I quite grasp that," said Jimmy.
"Then why go on worrying me? For it does worry me."
"I'm not going to worry you, Beth. What I want to do is to propose——"
"I won't be proposed to again to-day."
"I'm not going to propose in that sense of the word," said Jimmy. "I'm going to make a proposition. Suppose I go off now and unearth that smuggler's ghost, find out what he'sat and why. Would you count that doing something? Something useful? Hang it all, Beth, I think you ought to. The old knights and fellows of that sort who went about killing dragons and giants were looked upon as most valuable members of society and the most conscientious girls were delighted to marry them. If I get rid of a ghost—— You may say what you like, Beth, but a ghost in a small village is a regular pest, much worse than most dragons. If I collar the malignant spirit of that smuggler and stop him throwing stones it'll be something done, won't it? A jolly sight more useful thing really than being chairman of a committee for infant welfare, which is the sort of thing you think I ought to do. If I smother that ghost, Beth, will you marry me?"
"I'll—I'll think about it, Jimmy."
"Very well," said Jimmy, "come up to the church."
"The church?"
"You suggested going to the church beforewe explored the cave. What's wrong about going there now?"
"But what do you want to go to the church for? You said you hated churches."
"The mediæval knight," said Jimmy, "always went to church before he set out to slay dragons. He generally spent a whole day there, consecrating his sword and that sort of thing. Come on."
"I won't go to the church with you if you're going to do anything profane or make jokes about religion."
"I'm going to discover a ghost," said Jimmy. "You can't call that profane."
They passed through the middle of the rehearsal. Mrs. Eames shouted at them entreating them to stop and give advice about the proper way of handling kegs supposed to contain French brandy. Sir Evelyn descended from his perch and wanted to start a discussion about the rigging of the lugger. Jimmy took no notice of either of them. He waved his hand cheerfully to Mrs. Eames, and when his uncle caught him by the sleeve scarcely allowed himself to be stopped.
"Later on," he said. "I'll go into all that in an hour or so. Just at present I can't. I'm frightfully busy. I've a most pressing engagement. The whole future of the pageant depends on my keeping it. Come on, Beth."
They crossed the beach and reached the green. There they were approached by the two girls who had been left in charge of the horse. Earlier in the day they had been eager enough to be allowed to hold it. Now they were thoroughly tired of the job, and felt that they were missing all the fun that was going on at the mouth of the cave. They wanted to be released.
"Certainly not," said Jimmy. "Life isn't all fun. You ask this lady," he pointed to Beth, "and she'll tell you that the great thing is to be real and earnest and doing some jolly useful kind of work, holding a horse, for instance, or chasing ghosts or anything of that sort which is really hard work and is done for the sake of others. That's it, isn't it, Beth?"
Beth looked at the girls who wanted to be off and hated holding the horse. She looked at the horse, which also wanted to be off and hated being held.
"I really think," she said, "that Aunt Agatha wouldn't mind if they went away."
"Beastly inconsistent of you, Beth," said Jimmy. "I think you ought to tell those girls what you're always telling me. I mean about getting married. Now, listen to me, Millicent Pamela. And you, Gwendoline Irene—those are your names, I suppose."
The girls grinned shamefacedly. With an instinctive knowledge of the taste of village people he had got the girls' names very nearly right. One of them was Auriole Millicent and the other Eunice Gwendoline.
"The lady says that if you don't slay dragons or hold that horse or chase a ghost or do something like that, no nice man will ever marry you. That's it, isn't it, Beth?"
But the girls did not wait to hear what Beth had to say. They were prepared to sacrifice their chance of getting husbands rather than miss the gathering at the mouth of the cave.
Beth and Jimmy climbed the steep path which led to the church. The two Whittles, their flag signalling accomplished, had gone away. Jimmy walked slowly round the churchyardlooking at the graves with some attention. The tombstones were all in place and looked as if they had not been disturbed for years. Not a single grave had been recently opened.
"What are you doing?" said Beth.
"Looking for the ghost," said Jimmy, "who's throwing stones through the roof of the cave."
He climbed on the wall of the churchyard and looked down, standing in the very spot which had been occupied by the Whittles an hour before. He saw the green, where the horse, released from bondage, was grazing quietly. He saw the stony beach. He saw the face of the cliff beyond the cave. He peered over and looked straight down. He turned and looked at the cliff behind the church, a precipice of rugged rock.
"Well, I'm hanged," he said.
"What is the matter?" said Beth.
"I'm hanged if I thought that even the ghost of a smuggler would have done it," he said. "What lawless ruffians those fellows were! But even so I'd have expected them to have some regard for the church."
"I don't know what you're talking about," said Beth.
"Well, you ought to know. And considering it was you who drove me on to do it I don't see how you can possibly not know."
"Drove you on to do what?"
"Find the ghost of the smuggler who's throwing stones. He must have dug a hole somewhere to throw them through, mustn't he? Even a ghost can't throw stones through solid earth. And he must have done it up here, for the place is right over the cave. My idea was that he was operating through a grave, his own very likely, but he isn't. Nothing could be more peacefully undisturbed than all these graves, not a tombstone so much as knocked sideways. Still there the facts are. Somebody is dropping stones from somewhere into the chimney at the end of the cave and if it isn't from a hole in the graveyard it must be from inside the church. The next thing is to go inside and look."
"But Uncle Timothy's there," said Beth, "and if anybody was digging a hole in the church he'd stop them."
"He might not. It all depends on who wasdigging. Lots of people would hesitate to interfere with the ghost of a smuggler."
The south door of the church was locked. The small door which led into the vestry was locked, too. The large west door under the tower had not been opened for years. Loud knocking on one door after the other brought no answer.
"Uncle Timothy," said Beth, "must have gone to sleep. I don't wonder. I expect Aunt Agatha keeps him awake most of the night telling him that he really ought to do something for the parish."
"So he ought," said Jimmy. "I quite agree with your aunt. I quite agree with you, too, Beth, when you say that sort of thing. I wonder if we could open a window and climb in."
"Church windows don't open," said Beth.
Perhaps some day they will, if the Modernists get their way. Then all sorts of dangerous draughts will blow the altar hangings about, dissipate the smell of incense and dying flowers, even disturb the heavy stuffiness of centuries of ordered piety. In the meanwhile Beth was right. Church windows are not made to open.
Next to getting in, which appeared to be impossible, the best thing was to look in. But here again there were difficulties. Church windows are set high in walls and cannot easily be reached. But Jimmy was a young man of great determination. He found a shed in a corner of the churchyard. In it the sexton kept a scythe, a mowing machine, some cans and a bier, a four-wheeled vehicle with rubber tyres. Jimmy wheeled it out and set it under a window. Beth protested. She feared that this use of a bier if not actually sacrilege was an offence against decency. Jimmy climbed up on the bier and peered through the window.
He had a clear view of the nave of the church. He could peer down into the pews, could see the pulpit, the font and the lectern. There was no sign that the pavement or flooring had been disturbed anywhere. Worshippers might have entered, had in fact entered, three days before, and sat in their accustomed seats and listened to all that they expected to hear without being struck by anything unusual in the condition of their church.
Jimmy moved the bier to a window in thechancel and climbed up on it again. He found himself looking down into the high-sided square pew, surrounded with curtains, which stood close to the chancel rails. It had been set apart a century before for the use of the lord of the manor. It had been unoccupied for at least fifty years by anyone, except the vicar, when he used it as a study and sat in one of the arm-chairs with the tattered carpet under his feet, reading Epictetus.
When Jimmy looked down into it the arm-chairs had been moved and piled into a corner. The carpet had been rolled up. The flooring had been removed. In a deep hole in the middle of the pew he saw the back of the Reverend Timothy Eames bent low over a spade.
"Well, I'm properly and completely damned," said Jimmy.
Beth was steadying the bier, which had a tendency to run away whenever Jimmy moved. She was very naturally shocked at the use of this language by an unauthorised layman so near the church. The position of the clergy is quite different. They are actually commandedto say "damn" not only near but inside the church.
"Jimmy dear," she said, "do you remember where you are?"
"Get up here," he said, "and peep in. Then you'll forget where you are and either say 'damn' or something worse."
He jumped down, upsetting the bier, a vehicle not designed for the use of active passengers. When it was on its four wheels again he helped Beth on to it and she took her turn at peering through the window.
"Good gracious!" she said. "It's Uncle Timothy."
"There's a Lisping for that Lilith of yours for next week," he said. "'The floor of a parish church dug up by pious vicar.' Such a thing has never been heard of before."
"Jimmy," she whispered, "do you think—— I've heard that the clergy are often buried in the chancels of churches, and he does have a trying time sometimes with Aunt Agatha? Do you think he can be digging his own grave? Oh!"
The exclamation was forced from her by thefact that the vicar, startled by some sound, suddenly stood upright and stared at her. Beth's nerves had already been shaken by the noises and the falling stones in the cave. It was small wonder that the sudden rising of her uncle from what looked like a grave startled her afresh.
The vicar was nearly as frightened as she was. A face appearing at a church window high up in the walls of a chancel is scarcely likely to belong to a human being. In all probability it is an angel, and though we respect angels and like to sing hymns about them we do not want to come into personal contact with one. Their portraits are all very well and can be comfortably admired when painted on the glass of church windows. The actual face pressed against the glass outside is not such a pleasant thing to see.
Mr. Eames recovered his self-possession before Beth regained hers. He recognised his niece, and having recognised her was embarrassed rather than frightened.
"My dear Beth," he shouted, for it is necessary to shout if conversation is to becarried on through a stained glass window. "I didn't expect to meet you here, but I'm very glad, very glad indeed to see you. I'll come out to you and then we can both go down to the vicarage for tea. You're sure to want tea. I know I do. To tell you the truth I forgot to bring up any sandwiches to-day, so I've had no lunch."
He rubbed a little of the clay off his hands, laid the floor boards of the pew over the hole and replaced the carpet. Then he unlocked the south door of the church and greeted Beth. She introduced Jimmy. The Vicar looked first at one and then at the other with a whimsical little smile.
"You young people have caught me," he said. "But I hope——it's rather a humiliating request to make but I hope that you won't find it necessary to tell anyone what I was doing."
"As if we would, Uncle Timothy," said Beth. "Especially Aunt Agatha."
"Yes, yes, especially your aunt. Of course I'm going to tell her all about it in the end. But the fact is—— You know, my dear Beth,how your aunt is always telling me that I ought to do something for the parish."
"Poor Uncle Timothy!" said Beth.
"She's quite right," said Mr. Eames mildly. "I've always admitted that she's quite right. A man ought not to live without doing something."
"That's exactly what Beth says to me," said Jimmy, "and she's quite right, too."
"My difficulty," said Mr. Eames, "was to discover something which I could do, and at the same time something that would please your aunt. Now I think I've found the exact thing."
"Uncle Timothy," said Beth, "I don't believe Aunt Agatha is as bad as that. I know she's really fond of you. She won't be pleased. She really won't. She'll be very sorry, heartbroken, when you tell her that you've dug your grave."
"My grave! My dear Beth! Dug my grave! But I haven't. Nothing of the sort."
"Then what on earth were you digging?" said Beth.
"That," said the vicar, "is quite a long story."
It was; but he told it. Sitting on a flat tombstone with Beth on the grass at his feet, and Jimmy, fairly comfortable, full stretch on the bier.
Years before, soon after coming to Hailey Compton, the vicar had heard that there was some connection between the church and the cave. A legend existed, repeated without conviction by the old people in the parish, that the smugglers, in the irreverent days of the eighteenth century, used to store their goods in the church itself. But such stories are common all over England. There is scarcely an ancient church but rumour speaks of a covered way between it and a cave or the ruins of a monastery or a house which occupies the site of what was once a baron's castle. There is at least one church which tradition insists on connecting with a neighbouring public-house. If that passage could be found—and traces of it were discovered lately by men engaged in making a drain—it might be used as an argument by temperance reformers to demonstrate that an immoral alliance has always existed between the church and the brewery. Or bythe advocates of more and better beer, to prove that the church, in the days when its faith was still undefiled by Henry VIII and Elizabeth, was not hostile to the natural joys of life. Such is the peculiar value of arguments based on historical and archæological research. They can be used with equal force on either side in any modern dispute.
Mr. Eames, knowing the untrustworthy nature of local legends, paid no particular attention to that which connected his church with the smugglers' cave, and might never have investigated the matter if he had not been troubled by a loose board in the floor of the pew to which he had retired to read Epictetus. Day after day this board wobbled and shook under the leg of his chair when he sat down. He remembered the same thing happening when he had retired to the church for a few days during the starting of his wife's plays. Then, since he did not stay long, the thing had not mattered much. On the occasion of the pageant it became a serious annoyance. It was no use moving the chair, for wherever he put it one of its legs stood on a loose board. It appearedthat nearly all the boards in the floor of that pew were loose.
Goaded to exasperation he at last took up the well worn and exceedingly dirty carpet to find out what was the matter with the boards. He discovered to his amazement that they were not only loose but movable, and evidently intended to be movable. One of them had a brass ring, by which it could without difficulty be lifted out of its place. Once it was lifted those on each side could be moved too. Mr. Eames, mildly excited, uncovered a square hole into which it was possible to step.
The legend of the existence of a passage connecting the church with the cave came back to his mind. There must, he thought, be some truth in it, for he had lit on what looked like the end of a passage leading from the church to somewhere, perhaps into the cave. With the aid of an ordnance survey map and some measurements which he took, he reached the conclusion that the end of the cave must be directly under the church. He discovered the chimney in the cave's roof which had excited Beth and Jimmy when they found it. It seemedperfectly plain that the hole inside the church and the chimney in the cave were part of one passage. Unfortunately the hole was filled with stones and loose earth. In order to establish the connection, Mr. Eames had to do some excavating. He brought up the spade from the vicarage and afterwards the pickaxe which Mrs. Eames missed and supposed to be lost or stolen. Coming on a large block of stone, one of the main causes of the obstruction, he found that he could not move it with his hands. He went very early in the morning and took young Bunce's tackle from the mouth of the cave. After the removal of that stone he got on rapidly and had almost completed the clearance when Beth and Jimmy visited the cave.
"I have great hopes," he said simply, "that your aunt will be pleased when I show her the hole leading straight down into the cave."
"I'm sure she will," said Beth.
"And she'll never be able to say again that I do nothing for the parish. A discovery like that ought to be quite useful for any parish. Don't you think so?"
"It will make Hailey Compton famous,"said Beth, "and Aunt Agatha will be able to get up another pageant to show it off."
Jimmy seemed uninterested in the ultimate value of the hole to the modern parish. He wanted to understand what it was like and how it was originally used.
"Are there any remains of steps?" he asked.
"Oh no," said Mr. Eames, "it's just a hole. In fact I shall have to be very careful not to fall through when I'm finishing off the digging."
"I didn't see any sign of steps at the lower opening," said Jimmy.
"They may have used ladders," said Beth.
"My idea," said the vicar, "is that the men didn't go up and down at all. The passage was only used for hoisting things from the cave into the church. It's just a straight drop like a well, and anything could be pulled up."
"Anyhow," said Jimmy, "it's a most interesting thing and everybody ought to be most grateful to you for finding it."
"You really think so," said the vicar with an anxious little smile. "I should be very happy if I thought my wife would take that view of it."
"Oh, she's sure to," said Beth.
"But don't tell her about it until it's quite finished. It would be so much better if it comes to her as a surprise."
"I won't open my lips," said Beth, "and you can count on Jimmy. He's most reliable."
"And do you really think," said the vicar, appealing to Jimmy, "that I have succeeded at last in doing something for the parish?"
"I can only say, sir," said Jimmy, rising from the bier, "that I wish I'd half your luck. I came up to your church this evening hoping to find something really useful to do, something which would redeem my life from mere fatuity——"
"Oh, do shut up, Jimmy," said Beth. "I never said that."
"Not in those words," said Jimmy, "not in nearly such nice words, though you are an author. But it's exactly what you meant. And now I find——" he turned to the vicar, "that you've been beforehand with me. I congratulate you."
The vicar seemed puzzled. He looked inquiringlyat Beth out of his colourless, watery eyes, while Jimmy shook his limp and earthy hand with painful heartiness.
Of the actual performance of the Hailey Compton pageant it is surely unnecessary to give any account here. Every newspaper in England devoted columns to the description of the brilliant scene. It is impossible for anyone to have escaped reading something about it and, knowing that it was an immense success, perhaps the most popular show since the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria. The least observant among us can scarcely have helped looking at the picture of the last Prime Minister, in a silk hat and frock coat, shaking hands with Lord Colavon, the helmsman of the lugger, who was attired, in spite of Sir Evelyn's antiquarian scruples, in white flannels and a yachting cap. Quite as widely reproduced was the photograph of the bishop patting the head of one of the pack horses, while the two girls responsible for it stood beside him with chaste smiles, as ifthey expected to have their heads patted when the bishop had done with the horse; which indeed happened to both of them, though the photographs of that patting were not published.
The day of the performance was singularly fine, which was pure luck, but helped greatly towards its success. Had it been raining or even drizzling the great scene would almost certainly have been a failure. The flare on the church tower might have smoked instead of blazing. The signal lamps on the lugger out at sea would have been invisible on shore. But it was not luck, it was skill, which chose the exact moment for the arrival of the lugger. An hour earlier, when the glow of the setting sun was still strong, the blaze on the tower would have been unimpressive, and the flashing lights at sea would have escaped notice altogether. An hour or two hours later, when the twilight had died away, it would have been impossible for the spectators to see what happened when the lugger reached the cave. But Mrs. Eames—Sir Evelyn got the credit in the newspapers but Mrs. Eames deserved it—chose what Beth in a description of the performance calledthe psychological moment. It was just dark enough for the signal lights to make a good display, and there was still light enough to allow the operations of landing the cargo to be observed.
It was skill and not luck which selected the day for the performance, and here the credit belongs almost entirely to Lord Colavon. He discovered a day—perhaps the only day during the whole of that summer—when there was nothing else of great importance going on. Ascot was over. The Wimbledon Tennis Tournament had not yet begun. There was a pause between the first and second Test Matches. Yachts had not yet begun to race in popular waters. Interest in the regatta at Henley had died away. The fashionable world and that greater public which amuses itself in fashionable ways had nowhere particular to go on that particular day; no engagements and nothing fresh to talk about. The Hailey Compton Pageant filled a gap.
It had been very well advertised, again a matter of skill, though mingled with luck. It was Beth Appleby who deserved praise for theadvertising. She did not, indeed—no single person could—write all the preparatory notes and articles which appeared for weeks beforehand. She did not supply the papers with all the photographs they published. Other journalists, discovering and developing the popularity of the pageant, earned their guineas. But it was Beth who did the spade work and forced the pageant on the attention of editors who might otherwise not have noticed it. Her character sketch of James Hinton—"Valet and Artist"—attracted attention in a popular Sunday paper. A study of Mrs. Eames as an enthusiastic and successful reviver of the best features of mediæval village life, with its apt quotations from Blake's poems—"Dark, satanic mills" and "England's green and pleasant land"—won the sympathy and support of the intellectual neo-Catholics, a school of writers who still possess a great, though diminishing influence among the members of suburban literary societies. Her intimate account of Sir Evelyn's home life—"Studious research and patient pursuits of original sources"—was read, or at all events talked of, all overOxford. It was she who circulated the first published photograph of the cave, several "camera portraits" of old Bunce, of the mentally deficient Whittle, and of Lord Colavon seated at the steering wheel of the Pallas Athene. Her success stimulated other photographers, and the press was flooded, though by no means sated, with snapshots of every person and place connected with the pageant. There was even, in one paper, a picture of Mr. Linker, standing, with a smile on his face, in front of the door of his shop in Morriton St. James.
The results of all this care, thought and skill, were obvious early on the afternoon of the great day. People had talked to each other about Hailey Compton and wondered where it was. Newspapers found themselves obliged to publish road maps, often very inaccurate, to satisfy this desire for information. Motor-cars of every size and make converged on the stretch of down land above the cliffs, followed each other in a long procession along the road, and plunged, one after another, down the twisting lane. There were no accidents, because it was impossible for any car to break free fromcontrol and rush down the hill. When any brakes failed or any driver lost his nerve, his car merely bumped gently into the one in front. There was not room for it to gather dangerous speed before the collision and to produce disaster it would have had to push, not one or two but at least a hundred cars in front of it, a thing impossible for any single car to do.
A little more than half-way down the hill Mr. Linker had established a kind of toll-gate through which no car was allowed to pass without the payment of a fee. Some people resented this interference with the freedom of the King's highway, but their protests were futile. They never had time to say much or express their feelings fully, for the pressure of the cars behind drove theirs forward while they were still arguing about their rights. The takings at this toll-gate were enormous.
The catering for the multitude—preliminary afternoon tea and cold supper afterwards—was managed by James Hinton. There was, late in the evening, a shortage of ham, tongue and lamb, for the numbers exceeded all expectation.But the cold beef held out until the end and there was no failure of salad.
For Mrs. Eames the day was one of unmixed and rapturous delight. Every single part of the performance went without a hitch, exactly as she had planned it. Even the mermaid dance—Mary Lambert and twenty village girls along the margin of the sea—was successful, a surprising thing and highly creditable to every one concerned in it, for it was very difficult to dance gracefully over large, round stones.
Sir Evelyn was well pleased with himself and everyone else. His introductory speech, those few words, without which no function of any sort can get started, were taken down by eager reporters, and cheered by all who could hear them and many who could not. He had on one side of him the Chief of his Party, who shook hands with him in warm congratulation when the performance was over, and on the other side, the bishop, who graciously expressed a wish that the whole thing might be done again in the grounds of his palace, fifty miles inland, for the benefit of the cathedral funds. Other eminent men and women who clustered behindhim, were fluent in their compliments, which was easy for them, because each one had come with a neat little speech prepared, in case, as each one hoped, such a thing should be required.
Sir Evelyn felt that he was once more in his proper place, almost as prominent as he had been and hoped to be again when his Party was in power and he was a Cabinet Minister. But though pleased and satisfied, Sir Evelyn was exceedingly tired when the affair was over. His labours had begun long before he arrived at Hailey Compton for the performance, and continued for two whole days after the pageant was over. He entertained for the occasion all the more eminent patrons of the pageant, and they made a difficult party to manage. The bishop was as suave and smiling as a Christian prelate ought to be, and he got on very well with the young actress who talked with him in the latest slang. But he did not get on equally well with the titled doctor who happened to be an anti-Christian by temperament, and wanted to repeat all the witticisms he had ever heard about the Church when he found himself, a little unexpectedly, in distinguished company. Therewere moments of anxiety when the judge, who was strongly prejudiced against all doctors, insisted on saying what he thought about expert medical witnesses, and the evidence they gave. Beth Appleby and Mary Lambert would, perhaps, have been no great help to Sir Evelyn even if they had been still at the Manor House. They had both gone to the vicarage at Hailey Compton before the important guests arrived. Mary had to be on the spot for rehearsals of the mermaid dance. Beth found it desirable to be at the centre of activity. Both knew that there would be no room for them at the Manor House and had enough tact and good sense to go away, though Sir Evelyn invited them to stay on. Jimmy was with him still, and was really helpful. Having the sort of temperament which is unaffected by the pomposities and vanities of elderly and successful men, he remained infectiously cheerful and often saved an awkward situation by making jokes so silly that everybody, except the actress, united to snub him and felt quite friendly with each other when they had succeeded. But even Jimmy added a little to his uncle's difficulties with the party.He took the ex-Prime Minister out for a drive in the restored Pallas Athene and frightened him so much that for a whole day afterwards he was querulous and captious, the result of a severe nervous shock.
Thus it was that when the pageant was over, and two days later the last eminent guest had gone, Sir Evelyn was thoroughly tired, and glad to sit down quietly in his study. He felt a great yearning for silence and solitude. His surroundings promised him just what he wanted.
The sun shone in pleasantly through a large south window and the glare, which is the great fault of shining summer suns, was reduced by the leaves of a virginia creeper which clustered on the wall round the casement. Outside, a breeze made a gentle rustling through the branches of a glowing copper beech. The long herbaceous border was ablaze with colour, the brilliant blue of anchusas, the mauves and pinks of tall foxgloves, the white of a ribbon of low pinks, the subdued blue of violas, and the rich reds of many sweet-williams. Sir Evelyn, looking out, enjoyed a sense of mild relief—mild because he was too tired to feel anythingstrongly, even the delight of sunshine and the colours of the flowers.