Appleby's End (2 page)

“In America,” said the stranger, “the development of the locomotive dates from almost the same time as in England. In 1828, on behalf of the Delaware and Hudson Canal Company, Horatio Allen ordered three locomotives from Messrs Foster and Rastrick, of Stourbridge. One of these, the Stourbridge Lion, was actually the first practical steam locomotive to run in America, which it did on the 9th of August 1829.”

“Most interesting.” Appleby groaned inwardly. No doubt this elderly person had an attic at home full of toy trains and signal-boxes, and on these he would now discourse for some considerable time. But at least he appeared to be unattracted by popular criminology. “I see, sir,” Appleby added civilly, “that you are interested in railway history.”

“Dear me, no! In fact, certainly not. I have no interest whatever in such a subject.” The elderly man raised his book again, rather as if positively offended. Then, seemingly feeling that he had been too abrupt, he spoke once more. “I wonder if I might have the pleasure of lending you a book during our journey? This” – he tapped the book he had been reading – “is Dr Bossom's recent work on the Docetists. A somewhat diffuse exposition, I am afraid. But here” – and the stranger rummaged in a small suitcase beside him – “is Stuttaford on the Monophysites – an altogether more concise monograph, if one may judge by bulk.”

“You are very kind” – Appleby was somewhat at a loss – “but I'm afraid that the subject of Heresy–”

“Is of no interest to you? Nor is it to me.” The elderly stranger was becoming quite cordial. “You would be inclined to say that the Docetists and the Monophysites – and for that matter the Pelagians and the Gnostic Ebionites – are today subjects of very limited popular appeal?”

“Extremely limited, I should imagine.”

“Exactly so.” The stranger nodded emphatically. “And if you will permit me” – he fished out a notebook – “I should like to make a note of your opinion. And now” – he rummaged again – “here we have two romances by Anthony Hope, Spratt's
History of the Royal Society
, somebody's recent life of Dostoievsky, Swincer and Tiver on the Tyrannosaurus, a current
Turf Guide
, a volume of Livy, two pamphlets on artificial respiration–”

“I think Anthony Hope would be best.” Appleby was now thoroughly mystified. Model railways had been a guess far wide of the mark. But what could one put in its place? The personal appearance of the stranger was itself puzzling. If it were possible to think of one of His Majesty's judges as reduced to obtaining his apparel from a superior second-hand shop while at the same time retaining the services of a competent valet – But Appleby shook his head. Judges don't go down in the world – or not in England. “I suppose,” said Appleby boldly over the first page of Anthony Hope, “that you are a bookseller or publisher?”

“Sir,” said the stranger, “I have never engaged in trade.”

This was distinctly crushing. The stranger, however, did not intend it to be final, for he was fishing in a pocket once more and presently produced a worn morocco case. “Allow me,” he continued, with formality, “to offer you my card.”

Appleby took the card.
Everard Raven
, he read,
Barrister-at-law
. So that was it, after all. And perhaps barristers go down in the world, even if judges don't – but not so far down as to engage in trade. On this some form of apology would no doubt be tactful. “Appleby's my name,” Appleby said. “I made my guess merely on the strength of the books you have with you. The subjects are so various that I can scarcely imagine even the most catholic reader being interested in them all. Indeed, there seems to be no possible connection between any two of them.”

Mr Raven closed Dr Bossom on the Docetists and crossed his hands comfortably over his carefully pressed waistcoat. “You are mistaken,” he said. “Pardonably so, it must be confessed. For the link, although it is there, is scarcely as philosophical as I would wish. As a man of letters – for I must explain, Mr Appleby, that I have long since given over the practice of the law in favour of literary pursuits – as a man of letters, I must confess, indeed, that the link is a sadly arbitrary one. It is very much that which had to content the good Fluellen when he came to compare Macedon and Monmouth.”

“A river in each,” said Appleby. “And salmon in both.”

Mr Raven nodded, evidently much pleased. “I perceive that you are a student, Mr Appleby. And the common factor among my small batch of books should now be obvious to you. The Docetists and the Monophysites may be subsumed under the common term Religion; Dostoievsky suggests Russia; the Tyrannosaurus is a Reptile; Livy treats of the history of Rome; the
Turf Guide
concerns Racing; artificial respiration is an aspect of Resuscitation; and Anthony Hope wrote about Ruritania. The link, in fact, is alphabetical. I am deep in the doggy letter, sir.” Mr Raven paused and chuckled. “What the grammarians were fond of calling
litera canina
. And hence too those floating scraps of information on Railways with which I had the pleasure of initiating our acquaintance.”

“Then would I be right,” asked Appleby, “if I were to have another guess and say that you are editing an encyclopaedia?”

“Your guess,” said Mr Raven, “would be approximately correct. Unfortunately” – he spoke with sudden gloom – “the word ‘edit' scarcely meets the case. You would do better to say ‘compile.'”

“Compile?”

Mr Raven nodded. “I write it.” He lowered his voice. “I write,” he said unexpectedly, “the whole damned thing.”

 

 

It was dark now and the journey had become interminable. The engine, while daylight lasted simply an obsolescent locomotive tugging grimy carriages across English ploughland, was now a creature alien and dragonish, panting on some vast and laboured quest. The engine was a monster – one of Swincer and Tiver's Dinosauria, Appleby thought – with ghastly respirations striving to free itself from an engulfing Jurassic slime. Its reeky breath, faintly luminous, flipped momentarily at the windows. Sometimes, with an indescribable eeriness, it howled against the night. The pinch of famine this, perhaps – for station by station its clanking and jerkily oscillating maw was voiding itself into the murk: more passengers were getting off than getting on. Behind the grimed glass bowl the stinking little light now shone on the dusty red of empty seats, on cigarette butts and the dottles of pipes, on banana skins and orange peel mingled and pashed with the weed-killers, the love-nests, the ephemeral renaissance of Gaffer Odgers. Only the four corners of the carriage were occupied. In one a priest, heavy-breathing and rumbling dyspeptically within, stared with glassy concentration at an open breviary. In another was a slatternly woman clutching an idiot boy. Mr Raven, with a censorious pencil poised over Dr Bossom, occupied a third. And in the fourth Appleby, his overcoat buttoned up to his nose, endeavoured to grapple with Anthony Hope's
The Prisoner of Zenda
. “Being the History,” he read, “of Three Months in the Life of an English Gentleman.” Well, perhaps the unfortunate man had attempted a cross-country journey in an English railway train.

“Boo,” said the idiot boy; “boo, boo.” The slatternly woman smiled gently and patted his hand. “Boo, boo, boo,” the idiot boy said; “boo, boo, boo.”

Appleby put down his book in desperation. “About that encyclopaedia,” he asked. “May I enquire how long it is likely to take you, and when you hope to publish?”

“Much of it is published already.” Mr Raven took off his gold-rimmed glasses and held them some inches in front of a markedly long nose. “
The New Millennium Encyclopaedia, edited by Everard Raven, with the Assistance of Many Scholars and Men of Science.”

“But I understood you to say that you were doing it all yourself?”

“As indeed I am. Our title-page, I fear, has been conceived according to the morality of merely commercial men–”

“Boo,” interrupted the idiot boy.

“–for a writer, surely, would judge the promise of an initial millennium enough, without the otiose superaddition of novelty.” Mr Raven paused evidently as on a well-worn joke. “And as for the Scholars and Men of Science” – he tapped his suitcase – “here they are. I have at least the advantage of being able to take my collaborators about with me.”

“I see. The whole affair must be rather a burdensome task.”

“Assuredly it is so. Particularly as we come out in fortnightly parts. I had a message only yesterday to say that
Patagonia to Potato
would be on the bookstalls on Thursday. It really is uncommonly harassing. When one has got to
Potato
one is devilish near this confounded
litera canina
, if the truth be told. And if I cut Railways down there's sure to be a row. I shall have to omit Ruritania” – Mr Raven shook his head dolefully – “there's no help for it. And, mind you, I doubt if anybody ever thought of putting Ruritania in an encyclopaedia before.”

Because the carriage was now nearly empty, its temperature was dropping rapidly, and as a result moisture was condensing on the roof and falling in plashy drops. The idiot boy began to wander about in the endeavour to catch these with his tongue. The priest closed his breviary, uttered a pious ejaculation
sub voce
and produced a bag of peanuts. “But at least,” said Appleby – who felt that a little cheerfulness would not be out of the way – “your doggy letter is a good distance down the alphabet. You must feel that you are nearing the end of the job.”

“That's true, of course.” Mr Raven nodded without conviction. “Unfortunately, after the encyclopaedia there's the dictionary.”

“The dictionary?”

“
The Revised and Enlarged Resurrection
. As a matter of fact, I've got some of the preliminary work on hand already.”

The priest leant across the carriage. “May I,” he asked gravely, “offer you a peanut?”

Appleby wriggled his numbed toes in their shoes. This now nocturnal journey was assuming a crazy quality in his mind. The train might be a Hitchcock train having its existence only on a ribbon of celluloid – in which case the priest was doubtless a beautiful female spy in disguise. Or the train might be an Emmett train lurking between the leaves of
Punch
– which would mean that it was filled with demons masquerading as farmers and retired colonels, and that the permanent way led only up the airy mountain and down the rushy glen. Not that Mr Raven looked like a demon. Indeed, he seemed tolerably well to support Dr Johnson's definition of a dictionary-maker as a harmless drudge. Or was there, as he looked up from Stuttaford on the Monophysites, a hint of rebellion in his eye? Appleby found it hard to tell. The engine hooted; above the priest's head the three waitresses stood at attention in their dingle; abruptly the idiot boy contrived to let down a window and there was a flurry of snowflakes and icy air.

“No, no, my lad; it won't do,” said Mr Raven benignly, and tugged the strap. “A dirty night, Mr Appleby. May I ask if you go far?”

“I change at Linger Junction.”

“Um,” said Mr Raven and relapsed into Stuttaford. Appleby shuffled his feet, kicked Gaffer Odgers under the seat and returned to his novel. “For what relationship is there,” he read, “between Ruritania and Burlesdon, between the Palace at Strelsau or the Castle of Zenda and Number 305 Park Lane, W?” The answer – it scarcely needed Scotland Yard to suggest – lay in Romantic Illegitimacy. A theme, thought Appleby, treated with rather more literary substance in Meredith's
Harry Richmond
.

“Boo,” said the idiot boy.

A booksy journey. The idiot boy, of course, was straight out of Wordsworth. And it was Mr Raven's doing. In Mr Raven's presence everything turned booksy. It was very likely that the priest was really the late G K Chesterton's Father Brown.

“The Ravens,” said Mr Raven suddenly – and much as if Appleby had been speaking this fantasy aloud – “have been literary folk for generations. As you probably know.”

“Oh, yes,” said Appleby. “Of course.”

“Which means that this sort of labour” – and Mr Raven tapped his suitcase – “is less burdensome than it would be to a person without a tradition of letters.”

“Ah,” said Appleby. “Tradition counts for a great deal, doesn't it?”

“Quite so. Only I must confess that I sometimes regret having undertaken these commissions. A systematic scholar, whose life is of necessity arduous, likes to have the satisfaction of feeling that his labours are on the frontiers of knowledge. But on what am I engaged here, Mr Appleby?” And Mr Raven tapped the suitcase once more. “
A rifacciamento
, sir; little more than a
rifacciamento
.”

“Consolidation,” said Appleby. “Yours must be regarded as a labour of consolidation. And of diffusion. Both, surely, very important functions of the scholar today.” Anthony Hope, he was thinking, would be far far better than this. For it was one of Appleby's weaknesses that he was apt, out of an amiable desire to give pleasure, to involve himself in conversations of just such a ghastly insincerity as the present. “The frontiers of knowledge,” he added, going the whole hog, “are important, of course. But we must not forget the welfare of the interior. The provincial cities, Mr Raven, and the country towns. A good, popular encyclopaedia–”

Mr Raven, much gratified, was fishing in his pockets once more. “Really,” he said, “your image is so striking that I must be permitted to make a note of it. In moments of discouragement–”

The train, with a faint wheeze of escaping steam suggestive of more discouragement than a human being could express, drew to a halt. The slatternly woman woke up, grasped the idiot boy, and disappeared into the night as abruptly as a parachutist or a witch. The priest followed with an equal haste, as if he had some attempt at exorcism in mind. Appleby and Mr Raven were left alone. “Yatter,” said Mr Raven.