Appleby's End (25 page)

“Do shut up. It's–”

“–but mark too the worn line two inches above the cuff–”

“You silly ass!” With a strength born of much kneading of clay, Judith vigorously pinched her fiancé on the thigh. “It's Mr Scott, the publisher.”

“Of course it is. Ranulph Raven's publisher. And the other fellow is no one less than Liddell, the news editor of the
Blare
. What would he be doing round these parts, I wonder? But Rainbird is receiving them coldly. You can tell from the back of his neck that there is a frosty gleam in his eye. Publisher Scott is claiming old acquaintance. Editor Liddell is producing his card. Rainbird sees nothing for it but to show them into the library. Editor Liddell is plainly a stranger; he edges apprehensively past the first rank of Tartars–”

Judith scrambled out of the sarcophagus. “If you do retire from the police, why not get a job as a radio commentator? The Mayor has finished his speech. There is breathless expectation in the crowd. And now Lady Augusta has risen. I think – yes, I think – that the Mayor is about to hand her the trowel. We'll be certain of that in a minute. It's a lovely afternoon, a perfect afternoon; there must be at least four hundred people here; five hundred, perhaps I should say. Lady Augusta has taken the trowel; there's a man standing by with some mortar all ready–”

“And here comes Everard. He looks worried. Can it be that he is wondering whether the cabbage soup will go round?” Appleby followed Judith across the hall. Everard Raven, once more in his faded pink wine-jacket, stopped on seeing them.

“Judith, here is Scott come unexpectedly down. I wonder what can bring him to Dream? We must welcome him, of course, though I fear his visit must be described as a shade untimely. However, it will be a pleasure to have him meet John.”

“Perhaps that's why he has come,” said Judith gravely. “And isn't there somebody else?”

Everard glanced at a slip of pasteboard in his hand and looked more worried still. “A fellow who seems to have given him a lift. Another of these intolerable journalists, I fear.”

“News editor of the
Blare
,” Appleby said.

“Dear me! Well, Rainbird must simply turn him out. He must invite him out of the library and tell him pointedly that I am not at home.” Everard glanced at the card again. “A H Liddell. It wouldn't be Archie Hamilton Liddell, by any chance?”

“That's the man.” Appleby was decided. “Used to sign articles as A Hamilton Liddell.”

“Oh dear, oh dear!” Everard's voice rose to something like a wail of despair. “We were up at Corpus together. And Corpus men always continue to acknowledge each other, I suppose you know. An excellent custom, I am sure. Have you ever remarked the cold glare that marks the meeting of Balliol men wherever they be? Judith, I am afraid he must be asked to dine. Pray see Clarissa and let her speak to Rainbird and have him approach Cook. It may be that there are some tins of sardines–” And, agitatedly dodging Kurds and Tartars, Everard toddled off across the hall.

“Well, well!” said Appleby. He looked speculatively at Judith. “And all for Hannah Hoobin's boy.”

 

 

The dining-room had been illuminated with unwonted splendour; one could see the cobwebs in the corners, and the places where the wallpaper was peeling off, and a large patch of green and brown and yellow where the damp was coming through. But one could also see more of the artistic treasures of the Ravens, for hung round the room in pairs were the masterpieces of Gawain Raven, RA (1827–84), and Mordred Raven, ARA (1840–1900). Gawain, like Jan Davidsz de Heem and Adriaen van Utrecht, appeared to have painted straight from his stomach; his canvases were a riot of boars newly slaughtered, hams long since cured and now part demolished, half-empty glasses of wine, meat, game and vegetables piled in cornucopian profusion, and in the corners oranges and lemons carefully studied while in process of peeling. Mordred had painted from elsewhere; Susannah and the Elders was the subject by which his imagination had been most compelled, and covering the greater part of all his canvases were ladies so uniformly rosy that one was compelled to suppose him as having worked exclusively from models who had come straight from an uncomfortably hot bath. Occasionally Gawain appeared to have painted in a good square feed for Mordred's nymphs and goddesses – commonly in the form of an inordinate picnic displayed upon a grassy sward. And once or twice Mordred had provided Gawain with a background in which female forms, browned to a duskier hue, disported themselves on the surface of a canvas within the canvas. But this scarcely mitigated the somewhat overpowering regularity with which the pictures delivered their alternate summons to bed and board; and there was positive relief to the appetites as well as to the eye in certain large blank spaces arbitrarily disposed about the walls. It was to be suspected that the Ravens had been compelled at times to eat their way not only through copies of Dodsley's
Miscellany
, Dryden's
Fables
, and the voluminous works of Voltaire in full calf, but also through the fantasmal boars, hares, cucumbers and pineapples of Gawain's inspiration – and even to submit to the further indignity of being supported by whatever Mordred's rose-red Paphians could bring in. A critic of the family unamiably disposed might have maintained that their behaviour-pattern approximated to that of a cannibal culture of the baser and more utilitarian kind. They devoured their kinsmen, not for the sake of any mysterious power thereby gained, but simply of necessity when having a thin time. And this state of affairs – Appleby reflected as he sipped his claret – had its place in the deplorable mystery which it was now so desirable to elucidate or dispel.

And meanwhile the mystery held the board. Everard Raven had made some attempt to treat it as a subject unsuitable for present airing, but any resolution he brought to this course had been defeated by the general inclination of the company. Mr Liddell was openly curious; Mr Scott was discreetly so; and of the family only Miss Clarissa appeared to be entirely unoppressed by a sense of awkward issues pending. For the soup had been not cabbage, but artichoke; a mushroom omelette had followed; and now at a side table Rainbird was operating upon a noble loin of pork. These dishes, although possibly not of the first elegance, were amply sufficient to vindicate the dignity of the establishment – and, moreover, Peggy Pitches, albeit in a pair of new silk stockings of a shade scarcely congruous with a parlourmaid's attire, was manipulating the vegetable dishes competently enough. Miss Clarissa, therefore, had reason to be soothed. She had even made some entirely amiable remarks to Appleby. And now she was talking to Mr Scott on her left hand.

“The unfortunate man who died last night,” she explained, “was far from reliable. I could not conscientiously describe him as a valued servant.”

“His new situation,” said Mark, “is scarcely likely to be such that he will require a testimonial.”

“Although he had been with us for a number of years. Everard, for how many years had the man Heyhoe been in your employment?”

“Really, Clarissa, I can scarcely tell. Certainly, for a long time.”

“Quite so. And he was excellent with Spot, Mr Scott. And with the two horses we had before Scott – I mean Spot. And with the four horses we had before the two horses we had before–” Miss Clarissa paused, as one to whom a point of interest has just occurred. “Everard,” she continued, “I think it might be a good idea to keep four horses again. One would then have no hesitation in calling out the carriage.”

“None whatever,” said Everard.

“And Bidewell might be put in livery.”

“Bidewell?” said Mr Liddell. “Is that the thoughtful young man with the scholar's stoop?”

“And who has some knowledge,” asked Mr Scott, “of a piece of folklore about a head, which recalls the circumstances of Heyhoe's death?”

“I can scarcely subscribe to the scholar's stoop.” Everard Raven fidgeted with the stem of his wine glass. “But, as for the piece of folklore, it does appear–”

“And you have a Ranulph Raven story, turning on the same circumstance, preserved in manuscript?”

“That is so.” Everard looked round the table, frowning in perplexity. “But just how–”

“There may be something in this!” Mr Scott tapped the table for emphasis, and turned to Mr Liddell. “Liddell, don't you agree with me?”

“I am certainly inclined to agree. But, you know, it's uncommonly bewildering.”

“Very bewildering indeed,” Appleby interjected decidedly. “I don't know that I've ever come across anything more so. A literary sort of affair, too.”

“Ah,” said Mr Liddell with distaste. “Booksy.”

“Booksy?” said Everard with dismay. “What a dreadful word.”

“Exactly so. All this odd echoing of Ranulph Raven's stories–”

“Is most absorbingly interesting,” said Mr Scott.

“Interesting?” Mr Liddell shook his head. “To you and me – yes. I don't mind saying that I shall be uncommonly intrigued to hear the explanation of it. But whether we could put it across – well, that's another matter.”

Everard Raven set down his glass. “Put it across? Really, my dear Liddell, I quite fail to understand you. Here is a series of unaccountable events, most distressing to us all – and our only concern must be to avoid a vulgar scandal. I realise your professional interest in the affair, but I am sure that as an old friend you will agree to view that matter in a different way from these newspaper people who have been crowding about all afternoon. Indeed, I am hoping that you may have sufficient influence with them to – well, to tone the affair down. Nothing would dismay us more than some horrible form of publicity.”

“It would be most repugnant to us,” said Robert Raven – mildly and with a ferocious grimace.

“Entirely contrary to our family traditions,” said Luke.

Mark tilted his chin and emptied a glass of claret. “We should never hold up our heads again,” he said.

“Oh, come, come.” Mr Scott looked alarmed. “You must all please take a rational view of the affair. Just what the explanation of all these odd happenings can be I don't profess to know. But you must realise that the public is bound to be interested–”

“I'm not so sure about that.” Mr Liddell spoke with the gloom of a man who has rather rapidly reached the bottom of his first bottle. “I'm not at all sure about that. It's complicated. And there's what can only be called a strong intellectual element.” And Mr Liddell's features assumed an expression of distaste which was only modified as Rainbird approached with a decanter.

“The public can be
made
interested.” Mr Scott paused. “And we should be quite willing to acknowledge that as being in the nature of a service, my dear Liddell. In fact, there would have to be recognition – tangible recognition – of your part.”

Everard Raven poised a spoon absently before Peggy Pitches' bust. “I am entirely at sea,” he murmured.

“We are all wholly bewildered.” Mark Raven grinned wickedly. “Judith, what can our unexpected guests be after? And can it be possible that your young man knows?”

Mr Liddell was shaking his head thoughtfully. “I see the force of your argument,” he said to Mr Scott. “But can the thing be handled? That's the question. And I say at once that something very much simpler would have altogether more appeal. That's the opinion of the fellows out there.” He gestured towards the garden. “It's got them guessing, I don't mind telling you. So much so, that they've agreed to hold everything till tomorrow. They felt that if they rushed things the whole story would be in a muddle still when tonight's papers were going to bed.”

Mr Scott nodded with satisfaction. “So much the better. We have upwards of twelve hours to get the whole thing planned.”

“Simpler?” Appleby interrupted once more. “Have you heard of the sorcery, Mr Liddell? It seems to have nothing to do with our affairs here at Dream, but you might be interested in it, all the same.”

Everard Raven had produced a handkerchief and was mopping his brow. “I think,” he said, “that as we are squarely faced with our own untoward affairs we should stick to them and avoid distractions.”

“I quite agree, Raven.” Mr Scott was emphatic. “If Mr Appleby would defer–”

But Mr Liddell brushed his fellow guest aside. “Sorcery?” he asked curiously.

Appleby nodded. “Only this afternoon I was visiting an old woman of the name of Mrs Ulstrup in a neighbouring village. And – would you believe it? – somebody crept in and stole a piece of cake from her for the purpose of some sort of sinister magic. The local vicar knows quite a lot about it, by the way. It would probably be worth your while to have a chat with him. And then, only a few hours ago, there has been the queer affair of Sturrock's bull.”

Mr Scott set down his knife and fork and glared at Appleby. “To get back to Ranulph Raven–” he began.

But Appleby was explaining about the pins. And Mr Liddell listened with close attention. “Well, I'm blessed,” he said. “Bewitching the poor brute. And a bull, too – not a cow. There's always a bit of appeal in a bull. Yes, that's an uncommonly interesting thing.”

Mr Scott shook his head vigorously. “Interesting? It's quite stupid, if you ask me – and leads nowhere. Now, Heyhoe–”

“Very definitely leads somewhere,” Appleby broke in. “But how many people know in just what direction? I'm not sure that it wouldn't be as well to leave him alone until we find out.”

Everard Raven, harassed but still mildly cheerful, glanced down the table. “John,” he said, “pray let Rainbird give you a little more pork.”

It was a piece of hospitable care that was commonplace enough. But its effect was unexpected. Rainbird laid down his carving knife and advanced upon the diners. “Beg pardon, sir,” he said. “Beg pardon, marm.”